


and if tomorrow it's all over (at least we had it for a moment)

by ladybonehollows



Category: The Magicians (TV)
Genre: M/M, Miscommunication, reunited exes, wedding au
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-05
Updated: 2019-08-19
Packaged: 2020-07-31 15:13:53
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 45,461
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20117155
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ladybonehollows/pseuds/ladybonehollows
Summary: Taking a few more steps away, Quentin let go of her hand and turned to face her, ignoring the confused and amused expression on her face. "Where's the fire, Q?""The fire is right over there," he said, resisting the urge to nod or point or wave his arms, well aware that his faux cheeriness came out sounding a little closer to panic and oh god, was he panicking? "In the approximate size and shape of Eliot fucking Waugh."Somehow, he'd still expected surprise. The sheepish look he got instead was just too much. "Right. That."It's Julia's wedding day, and apparently no one bothered to tell Quentin that his high school boyfriend that he hadn't seen in ten years was going to be there. Quentin isfine.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> This fic has turned into a bigger thing that I was expecting when I first started writing it. I'm forever grateful for Riz and Gigi for reading this through as I wrote it and giving me advice, and for the RAO family for cheering me on.

“I _definitely_ saw a tear.”

“One tear? How could you see a tear from that far away? I was standing right next to him, there’s no way he was crying.”

“Fine. Whatever. Still doesn’t mean _you’ve _won, though. Hey Coldwater — don’t even think about breaking down on us during the speeches, I’ve got fifty bucks riding on this.”

At the sound of his name, Quentin reluctantly turned his attention back to Kady and Penny, and was met with identical smug grins. He hadn’t been paying full attention to them, but he cast his mind back over the parts of the conversation that he’d caught, forcing his face into a frown. “It’s rude to bet on if someone’s going to cry or not.”

Kady only grinned at him wider, reaching up to pat his cheek. “Oh, honey. When, not if.”

Rolling his eyes at her, he swatted her hand away, unable to keep up the churlish facade. Leaving the other two to their joking, he turned back to the crowd.

Julia was easy to spot, despite the dozens of people milling around her, waiting to congratulate her and admire her dress and her hair and the glorious smile on her face. God, she looked beautiful. And so _happy_, in constant contact with James — her hand in his, his arm around her waist, on her back, just close, constantly close, and yeah, he'd probably never seen a smile so big on James's face either.

Damn it, Quentin was _not_ going to cry.

The ceremony had been beautiful. He'd expected nothing less when the bride and groom were both self proclaimed overachievers, but he's sure that he wasn't the only one to feel like everything had paled in comparison to how Julia and James had looked standing up before the officiant, or the emotion in their voices when they'd spoken their vows. He'd heard both Julia's and James's in advance and they were beautifully spoken promises of the life they wanted to live together. Hearing them today, spoken to each other, they carried an extra weight that had his chest tightening just to think about it.

Quentin checked his watch — they had maybe twenty minutes before they had to steal Julia and James away for the photographs, two hours before the reception officially started. He wondered at what point he might be able to get away with loosening his tie without getting scolded.

"Hey, Quentin!" Quentin turned his head in the direction of Josh's voice, already smiling in anticipation of the excitement held in it, but the question of what he was up to died on his lips when his eyes landed on a familiar face over Josh's shoulder.

It couldn't be. He blinked, and Eliot was still standing there, his face blank as he watched him from the other side of the crowd. Eliot… what was _Eliot_ doing here? How did he… how did Quentin _not know_, that he was… He opened his mouth, his heart in his throat, he didn't —

"Quentin, did you see Victoria? That dress, dude — I mean, _damn._"

"What, um —" Quentin glanced at Josh distractedly, trying to wrap his head around, well, anything right now. "Victoria… what?"

Josh's response faded into the background as Quentin looked back past the dozen or so people between him and Eliot, only to find that him turned away, smiling as he spoke to the person next to him. _Margo_. Quentin huffed a laugh. God, he'd missed her. He'd missed —

_But what was he doing here?_

It had been years since he'd spoken to Eliot, a decade since he'd seen him. When he'd last seen him… that was a memory that had never faded. Standing here, looking at Eliot in the midafternoon sunlight, he was thrown back into the feeling of watching Eliot and Margo step up to the airport boarding gate, silently begging him to glance back at him, feeling utterly wrecked as he did so right before he stepped out of sight and out of his life.

Pulling his head out of his thoughts for long enough to reassure Josh that sure, he totally had a shot with Victoria if he played his cards right, he excused himself, stepping back into the crowd of people and forcing his way through them until he neared Julia. "Sorry, sorry," he said, weaving around a couple, and finally he was within reach of Julia. Reaching over someone's shoulder to grab her arm, he tugged at it until she looked up at him, smiling at him immediately and _oh yeah that's great, smile at me now but why didn't you tell me you'd invited my _ex boyfriend_ to your wedding?_

"Hey, um, photos," he said, nodding his head in the direction of the garden where they'd arranged to have the group shots done.

"Okay, cool. Hey, James," she said, half turning towards her husband, who stood behind her, facing the other direction as he spoke to his grandmother.

"No," Quentin said quickly, tugging on her arm and ignoring the way her eyebrows shot up. The lie was stupid, fine, lying was stupid, but he just really needed to talk to her, needed _answers_, and also definitely needed to _not _make a big deal about it in front of all of his best friends' friends and family. "Just. Just come with me, okay?"

"Okay," she said, eyeing him strangely before pulling his hand from her arm to take in hers, and didn't ask any more questions as he pulled her through the crowd. They had to pause a few times, stalled by a cousin who hadn't spoken to Julia yet, a friend who wanted to gush over her dress, but after a few minutes they managed to extricate themselves from the group. Taking a few more steps away, Quentin let go of her hand and turned to face her, ignoring the confused and amused expression on her face. "Where's the fire, Q?"

"The fire is right over there," he said, resisting the urge to nod or point or wave his arms, well aware that his faux cheeriness came out sounding a little closer to panic and oh god, was he panicking? "In the approximate size and shape of Eliot fucking Waugh."

Somehow, he'd still expected surprise. The sheepish look he got instead was just too much. "Right. That."

"Yes, that. Julia, why is he here? And why didn't you _tell me?"_ A thought occurred to him that he shrank back from instinctively, but he made himself face it, meeting Julia's eye despite the way he wanted to curl in on himself and turn away. "Have you been talking to him this whole time? Because — it's okay if you have, but it's just _weird _if you didn't tell me about it."

"What? No, it's not —" Julia sighed. "I didn't realise, okay? I've always known that James had a friend named Eliot, and that Eliot was coming to the wedding, but I didn't realise that it was _our_ Eliot until I saw RSVP 'yes Eliot Waugh plus one Margo Hanson'.” She grimaced at him beseechingly. “That was only two weeks ago, Q. I didn't want to freak you out at the last minute."

She didn't… at the last… Quentin stared at her, incredulous. She couldn't seriously… "How much more last minute can you _get_, Julia?" he stressed, reaching up to run his hands through his hair, to tug on it, to pull it out, _something_. 

Her hands caught his first. "Don't mess up your hair," she said, frowning at him before her face softened into apology. "Look. I'm sorry, okay? I should have said something. Did you speak to him?"

"No, I —"

"Is my best friend trying to steal my wife away already? Jesus, Q, can't you at least wait until we get back from the honeymoon?"

Julia grinned as she turned towards James, keeping her fingers twined with Quentin’s. “I’m being told off,” she said conspiratorially, the effect completely ruined by the laughter in her voice.

James held up his hands with a gasp when he reached them, playing into the drama. “On your _wedding day?_ Oh, the_ nerve._”

Biting on her lip, Julia glanced sideways at Quentin before turning back to James. She opened her mouth to speak, but Quentin was starting to feel a bit too much like the butt of the joke, and got there first. “Why didn’t you tell me that you and Eliot are friends?”

Something must have tipped to the others that he was done joking around, because the delighted grin on James’s face quickly faded. “Look,” he said, stepping forward and putting his hand on Quentin’s shoulder. He ducked his head a little so Quentin had no choice but to meet his eyes or else feel like an asshole. “Eliot and I met when our schools competed against each other in drama club before I knew you or Julia. When you and I met at college, he was just an ex of yours that you talked about sometimes, but I never put it together that it was the same guy I’d known. Honestly, I’d forgotten which school he’d gone to. We stayed in contact, caught up a few times for drinks when I travelled interstate for work. None of us put any of this together until —”

“Yeah, I know, until Julia saw his RSVP.” He wasn’t going to ask, he wasn’t, he — “What did he say? When he realised?”

The grin was back on James’s face in a flash, but it was Julia who answered. “We didn’t tell him. We picked him and Margo up at the airport yesterday with a huge sign that said ‘welcome home, assholes’.”

“Margo would have loved that,” he said distractedly, imagining the wicked grin on her face. More so, imagining the surprise on Eliot’s. So, he’d only just found out, too. He wondered if he’d thought of him anyway, when he was booking his flight home to Chicago. Was he happy to be here? He and Margo had been good friends with Julia at school too, it kind of made a weird sense that they’d end up at her wedding. It just — it was _awkward_.

But maybe it didn’t have to be. It had been _ten years_ since they’d broken up, and it’s not like he’d spent the whole time wallowing. James slung his arm around his shoulders. “Come on, Q. What’s a wedding without an awkward run in with an ex?”

And he was right. “Okay,” he said reluctantly. “I get it, it’s no big deal.” He knew he still sounded frustrated. Taking a deep breath, he forced himself to calm down and really look at how he was feeling. He wasn’t upset that Eliot was there. He was _nervous_ that Eliot was there — nervous about if they might talk, if they _wouldn’t_ talk, what they might say to each other. But mostly… “I wish you’d told me.”

James’s arm tightened around his shoulders, Julia’s hand squeezing around his. “We’re sorry,” she said, smiling at him apologetically. “We should have said something.”

And just like that, everything seemed to settle in his chest. He’d said what was bothering him, and things were still okay. He hadn’t ruined everything, and now that he’d dealt with it, he felt like he could deal with everything else and go back to celebrating his best friends without this hanging over him. Screwing his face up at her, he glanced up at James and then back at Julia, his show of disgust lessened by the grin he was trying and failing to hide. “God, you’re married for two minutes and everything’s already ‘we’.”

Tugging him in by the grip on his hand, Julia gave him a quick hug before pulling back and squeezing his face, her thumb and fingers pressing into his cheeks. “Now. Suck it the fuck up for the next hour, because my wedding photos are going to be _perfect.”_

* * *

When they’d been planning the wedding, Julia had brought up YouTube, and the second he saw the video title _Bridal Party Entrance Dances_, he’d threatened to abandon the whole best man thing if she made him do _that_.

Walking in with his arm linked through Penny’s was easy in comparison.

Even so, he kept his eyes straight ahead and prayed that he wasn’t going to trip as they walked up through the gap in the tables and over the dance floor that sat between the guests and the bridal table. He took his seat beside Kady just in time to see Julia and James walk through the doors, their hands clasped tight as they made their way through the hall. They’d barely taken their seats, the music still winding down, when someone clinked their knife against their glass. Half a second later everyone was doing it and James and Julia were kissing, smiling and laughing and so beautifully in love.

He spotted Margo amongst the tables before he found Eliot. Not that he’d been looking for him, but… well. Even from a distance, he could tell that Margo looked stunning in blue, her hair falling long around her shoulders. The smirk on her face was just as he’d remembered, and he followed her gaze to take in Eliot, sitting beside her.

He looked gorgeous, leaning back in his chair with his arm slung over the back of Margo’s. The expression on his face was so painfully familiar, and he found a smile pulling at his lips even as nostalgia twisted painfully at his heart. Even after all of this time, some of his best memories were from his last year and a half of school, with Julia and Eliot and Margo glued to his side, and seeing those smiles sent him right back into it. They both looked different, older, but still entirely the same, and he wondered how different he was from the person he’d been ten years ago.

He felt… steadier, against all evidence currently to the contrary. But he was. He hoped they were steadier, too.

They were seated at one of the tables about midway down but off to the side, with a handful of James’s friends. Well, Quentin’s friends too, he supposed, people they knew from UChicago, but James was the one who’d kept in contact with them. Margo was laughing about something, Eliot grinning at her sideways, and they looked _happy_. Which is… which was all he’d wanted for him.

Their break up had been amicable. Neither of them had been prepared for a long distance relationship at the age of eighteen, and Quentin had refused to stand in the way of Eliot's dreams. He and Margo had had stars in their eyes for the type of fame and acclaim that only a city like LA could offer ever since he'd met them, and it hadn't come as a surprise when Eliot had confessed to him that he wanted to live that life, that he'd wanted to give it a shot instead of going to college with him and Julia.

How could he have done anything other than wrap up his broken heart with scotch tape and see him off at the airport?

He'd been fairly confident that he'd never see him again. And now he was here, _at Julia's wedding._

Feeling a hand on his arm, he pulled his attention away from them and focused on Julia, who was angling for him to back her up on something she was jokingly bickering with Penny about. James sat between them, his hands raised in supplication, adamant that he was not getting involved, but apparently Quentin wasn’t going to be so lucky. “Tell him, Q. We went six times to see that movie when it first came out.”

It wasn’t so difficult to force Eliot and Margo from his thoughts, not when he genuinely enjoyed everyone at the bridal table. Julia was obviously having so much fun, and Kady was fun when she wasn’t being terrifying.

Still, every time there was a lull in the conversation, he found his eyes wandering toward the table where Eliot and Margo were sitting. He was entirely unsurprised to see what looked like Margo and Eliot tag-teaming a conversation while the others looked on. He wondered what kinds of stories they had now. He wondered whether he featured in any of the ones they were telling tonight.

The entrees came and went quickly, and when it was time for the speeches to start, Quentin forced himself to keep his hands in his lap instead of reaching for the champagne glass before him. He’d managed to forget, somehow, that this was a thing that he still had to get through without fucking up, but that unease sat with him all the way through Julia’s mother’s speech, through James’s father’s, through Penny’s. His nerves were a wreck by the time he had to stand up, and when Josh, who was the MC for the evening, came over with the microphone, he forced himself to reach out and take it without staring at it for five seconds like someone who was panicking over speaking.

“Don’t you dare make me cry,” Julia murmured from beside him, as though she hadn’t been surreptitiously wiping tears away all night. Then, “You got this, Q.”

Taking a deep breath, he let her confidence seep out into him. He hated talking in front of people, but this was for Julia and James, and he was prepared. Holding the microphone tightly in one hand, he pulled his handwritten notes from his jacket pocket, unfolded the paper and smoothed it out carefully. “Hi, um. I’m Quentin,” he said, forcing himself to smile as he looked out over all of the people whose attention was suddenly completely on him. The room was silent, not even a rowdy group at the back who wouldn’t stop whispering. Unfortunately. He swallowed down the lump in his throat, determined to get through this purely through strength of will. He speech was _good_, damn it, he just had to get it out without stumbling his way through it. “If you’ve met Julia more than once, you probably already know me, since we’ve lived in each other’s pockets since me and my dad moved in next door to her house when we were five.”

The smattering of laughter at his joke strengthened his resolve. “They say best friends are the people you call to hide the bodies, but…” He paused, staring at the lines on the page. He’d forgotten what he’d written — he’d had it memorised days ago, but until now he’d _forgotten_, and… He cleared his throat, his eyes on the words written out in his neatest handwriting. “But in my experience, they’re the people who know the right flavour of ice cream to show up with when you’re nursing a broken heart.”

It’s not like she’d only done it the once, but the memory hit him hard, of crawling into his bed and not wanting to leave for two days until Julia had just opened his door and slipped in beside him, tub of ice cream and two spoons in hand. He should move on, he should keep talking, he should look up at the crowd, but he knew exactly where his eyes would land.

“Cookies and cream,” Julia called out, and when he turned to look down at her she was smiling up at him brilliantly. Everyone laughed, and he took the moment to gather himself, profoundly grateful for Julia and entirely unsurprised. When was she not coming in clutch to save his ass?

He’d already poured his heart out into this speech, slaving over it for days to find the right balance of genuine feeling and humour, and he let himself lean on that. It had been difficult to put all of the weight of how much it had mattered to have Julia and then James by his side for so many years into five minutes, but he’d done the best he could, and he found himself relaxing into it as he read aloud the love that he’d poured onto the page. Somehow, he managed to pull the guests right along with him, laughter and “aww’s” in all the right places, and if his eyes were swimming when he turned back to them with his glass raised, he wasn’t the only one. “To Julia and James.”

“To Julia and James!”

Quentin took what was closer to a gulp than a sip of his champagne, then sank down in his seat in relief. Julia leaned sideways to bump his shoulder playfully, and he grinned at her sideways before facing forward again to listen to Josh… being Josh. Beautiful speeches, keep the drinks flowing, mains out soon etc etc.

He didn’t realise that his gaze was wandering until he was caught in Eliot’s, painfully familiar even ten years later and all the way across the room. He quickly moderated his grin, not wanting him to think that he’d been grinning _at_ him, but — oh god, he didn’t want him to think he was glaring at him either, and… what were normal expressions again?

He was too far away to see the nuances of his expression, and it had been so long since he’d seen him that he wondered whether he’d be able to read him the same way that he’d used to. Had he been watching him? Had he been thinking about their relationship during his speech? Quentin resisted the urge to shrink down in his chair, his mouth suddenly dry. He expected him to look away, awkward, and when he didn’t Quentin wondered whether he should, whether _he _was the one making it awkward, and —

And _it doesn’t have to be awkward, remember_?

Breathing in slowly, he smiled; an acknowledgement, a hello.

Eliot smiled back.

The scraping of Kady’s chair on his left made him jump, breaking him out of the moment, and he tore his eyes away to see her leaning back behind him, one arm on the back of his chair while she stage-whispered for Penny’s attention. Josh had returned to his seat, and everyone else was returning to their drinks and their chatter. Eliot had turned back to Margo, and Quentin watched him for a few moments before turning to see Kady reaching past the others to collect her fifty bucks.

* * *

After the main’s had been served (roasted pork with fancy glazed apples), Quentin swapped seats with Penny so he could chat to James and Fen for a while. He liked Fen — he’d met few people who were as full of light and laughter as Fen, and tonight was no exception. He’d forced himself to keep it light on the drinks, at least until he’d eaten, knowing that it was going to be a big night and that he didn’t want to forget a moment of it. The waiters kept a keen eye on the bridal table, however, and his second drink turned into his… something-eth when they routinely topped his glass up every time they passed the table.

He was definitely starting to feel the right kind of buzz when Josh gave them the heads up that they were about to do the first dance, and he hurried back to his seat just in time.

The opening notes for Ellie Goulding’s _How Long Will I Love You_ came on, and Quentin rested his elbows on the table, filling up with warmth as he watched James and Julia sway on the dance floor. They looked gorgeous, dancing together, smiling at each other as though nobody in the world existed other than the two of them, and Quentin was thrown back to another time. He didn’t know if it was just because his mind was already caught ten years in the past or not, but it was so easy to slip into the memory of Julia dancing with Richard at prom, while he’d stumbled through a dance with —

“_Quentin!_”

Starting, Quentin looked up at Penny, who was already halfway around the table to where they were supposed to be meeting on the other side, and tried not to shrink under his thunderous look. His glower shifted to an exasperated eye roll as Quentin pushed himself to his feet, forcing himself not to rush and make his distraction even more obvious.

“Where the hell are you right now?” Penny asked as his hand settled on his waist.

“I know, I know.”

Penny’s shoulder was firm under his hand, his other held tightly in his grasp, and somehow that in combination with the slow tempo of the music started to calm Quentin’s panicky mind. He spared a glance for Julia, who was watching _him_ instead of gazing up adoringly at James like she should have been, and he forced a reassuring smile at her before turning deliberately back to Penny.

A quick peek at Julia a few seconds later showed him that she was no longer watching him, and he swallowed down the lump in his throat, ignoring Penny’s questioning look. He was — fuck, he was ruining his best friend’s wedding. Well, okay, maybe not ruining it, but — but this was her night, hers and James’s, and he had to get his head out of his ass and stop thinking about himself the whole damn time.

As soon as the song faded out and the official first dance was done, Julia was pulling him in to dance, her eyes sharp as she looked up at him. “Stop freaking out,” she said firmly.

Pressing his lips together, he sighed. He was done pulling her focus from what she should have been thinking about tonight, done distracting her with his drama. “I’m not talking about it.”

“Q —”

“No. This is your wedding. Your _wedding_, Julia,” he said, raising his eyebrows at her. “That’s all that matters tonight.”

Julia’s eyes softened immediately, and she smiled up at him faintly as her hand shifted from his shoulder to touch his cheek. “Look at you, getting all serious on me,” she said quietly, and it was the perfect blend of fond and exasperated that Julia had gotten down to an art form. “I love you.”

Pulling her in close, Quentin closed his eyes for a moment, eternally grateful for Julia, and for how completely she understood him. “I love you too.”

“Well, good,” Julia said cheerfully, and he was instantly suspicious. “So, since it’s my wedding day and you love me, you’ll grant me this favour on the day of my, um, wedding day.”

The sudden shift in tone, combined with how utterly she’d _butchered_ that line, had him hiding his laughter in her hair. “That’s not how the line goes.”

“I don’t care.” She paused, pulling back again, and when she continued the laughter had faded from her voice, replaced with sincerity. “I just want you to have a good time, okay? We’ve got to make these moments count.”

_No. No, he was _not_ doing this_. He couldn’t — “We said we weren’t going to talk about that tonight,” he said, his throat suddenly tight, his hands flexing on her, but she didn’t let up with that soft, sad smile.

He couldn’t even think about it, let alone _talk _about it… that he wasn’t going to be able to see every day anymore, not in real life, not standing right in front of him. “Well, I’m talking about it,” Julia said, ignoring the pained look he sent her, her voice firm. “I’m going to talk about it for one goddamn minute, because — look at us, Q. James and I grew up and got fucking married. You’re about to move to New York for a writers residency. The _Rupert Chatwin_ Writer’s Residency. Take a second and be proud of us.”

He was. He still in disbelief over the whole thing, but he was so proud — of what Julia and James had done with their lives, outside of their relationship as well as together. Of himself, for not giving up on his dreams, even when it was hard, even when it felt impossible. Julia had been the one to push him to apply for it.

To have an opportunity like this was incredible, and to be sponsored for this particular residency meant more to him than anything he’d ever done. Rupert Chatwin was a hero of his, the books that he’d written a lifeline to a young boy who realised he liked other boys and wanted to see kids like himself riding unicorns and exploring fantasy worlds. Or, riding the Cozy Horse, but that was beside the point. Rupert Chatwin, who’d written himself going on adventures with his boyfriend Lance and his siblings, and then self-published when no one had wanted to take a chance on him, had become an idol for Quentin as quickly as the characters in his books had.

And when the great big world of publishing had finally recognised the importance of his books, and had published more and more of his work, he’d poured his money into a program to help young LGBT+ writers tell their stories in whatever settings or genre they wanted to explore.

A program that Quentin was leaving to be a part of in two weeks.

“I just… can’t believe I’m not going to see you for a whole _year_,” he said. It was an unbelievable opportunity and he _was_ excited for it, but leaving behind everyone he knew sometimes felt like more than he could handle.

Julia wasn’t buying into his pity party. “I’m not sure if you’ve heard of them, but there are these things called airplanes and phone calls and Facetime…” She trailed off, laughing at him, and he rolled his eyes at her, resisting the urge to break the dance to elbow her. “Look. It’s going to suck, but it’s going to be amazing. And we’re going to have an amazing time tonight, so we have all of these fun memories for when we miss each other, okay? So, stop freaking out, stop being all weird about Eliot —”

“I’m not being —”

“— and just have a good time, okay? _Please?_ Talk to him, don’t talk to him. Whatever is going to make you have a good night.”

He didn’t try to deny that Eliot had been on his mind. “You having a good night will make me have a good night,” he said instead, the deflection painfully obvious.

“Uh huh,” she said, with an exaggerated doubtfulness that made him smile. “You really wanna go around in circles like this all night?”

“Oh, definitely,” he said, tightening his grip on her before spinning them around in a circle, and her startled laughter was infectious.

* * *

“That’s — no, that’s _not _what happened,” Fen said, but she was practically doubled over in laughter. James waved off her protests, but she caught his hands, pushing them down. “No, I did _not _tell the CEO to go and… oh my god.”

_Shove his head up his ass to try and find a new perspective_, had been the words that James had used, and as much as he couldn’t imagine Fen talking to anyone like that _ever_, he wasn’t convinced that James wasn’t telling the truth. The two of them were in hysterics, trying to one up themselves with embarrassing stories from work, and the whole table had gotten caught up in which of them had outdone the other.

Grinning, Quentin took a drink of his wine, shaking his head at James when he caught his eye. He’d let the two of them pull him along to meet some of their old friends, who they’d both worked with in the past. He’d only met them maybe once or twice before, but they seemed like good people and he enjoyed the gentle ribbing that they all seemed to give each other — much like his relationships with Julia and James.

He was glad for it — he’d resolved to get out of his head for a little and just enjoy the night, and realised with surprise that he actually had. Ten years ago, or even five or two, he’d have spent all night either worked up or worrying about being worked up and yeah, sure, he’d done exactly that for the first hour or two, but now he was having _fun_, and he was going to enjoy that.

Quentin took a mouthful of his wine, and felt brave. “Nothing can be worse than that time you got drunk and told that stranger all about the financial market and how investing wasn’t going to be a good idea for what he wanted to get out of it, and then showed up to the meeting with your new investor the next morning only to find out that it was the same person.”

“Oh my _god,_” Fen said, laughing so hard she choked on her drink.

“Hey,” James said, straightening up in his seat and leaning forward and pointing at him over the table. “I told you that in _confidence_,” he said, grinning at him widely.

Shrugging, Quentin took another drink. “It’s your wedding, we’re supposed to talk shit about you.”

“I thought that was the bachelor party?” Pete said.

Quentin didn’t _love _Pete. Well, Pete was fine. Pete was… the kind of guy who usually didn’t have time for someone like Quentin. There was also the fact that Pete had had a raging crush on Julia when he’d first met her, despite her being James’s girlfriend, but apparently whatever drama that had caused between the two of them was long in the past, and he’d remained friends with James despite no longer working together. And he wouldn’t have been here if either he or Julia had issue with him.

And… sitting here and drinking with Pete and leaning into the whole fun vibe instead of making a reason to bring up old drama felt pretty good. Felt like _letting go_ and _not dwelling on the past_.

“Somehow, the bachelor party ended up more as ‘let’s pick on Quentin night’,” Quentin pointed out, without issue. He’d held his own, and then —

“It’s okay,” James was saying, relaxing back into his chair again and keeping his eyes warm on Quentin while he addressed the table. “He more than made up for it when he took all of our money in poker.”

He raised his glass at James with a grin, then turned to Fen. “Speaking of, you still owe me thirty bucks.”

Fen’s overdramatic huff turned into a giggle halfway through, and her eyes were twinkling when she said, “Okay, sure, but can I pay you tomorrow? I only had fifty on me and I had to give that to Kady when you didn’t cry as soon as you saw Julia in her dress.”

_Oh, cheap shot_. He glanced around for something to throw at her, but when he couldn’t find anything that wasn’t going to hurt or make a mess, he settled for sticking his tongue out at her, and got the same in response.

The talk turned to the company that Pete and the others worked for, and how things were both different and not so much since James and Fen had left. Quentin sat back in his chair, content to half-listen to their banter. Their conversation and laughter blended with that from throughout the hall, and Quentin felt warm and buzzed and comfortable.

And entirely unprepared for the sound of Eliot’s laughter, hitting his ears and rolling through his whole body in a shiver. He was jolted right back into the moment, overwhelmed by just how much he was thrown by the sound. It was one thing to see him, but to hear him, joyful and so close behind him and _real_, was another thing entirely, and his throat was suddenly tight, his skin hot.

He’d pushed it back all night so far, focusing on how awkward he was and how awkward this made him, and how that affected Julia and James, but. But he couldn’t pretend that he hadn’t really fucking _missed_ him.

He hadn’t even realised just how much until just now, and the vulnerability that clawed at the inside of his chest was too much, it was —

Something hard was digging into his palm, and he took a long, quiet deep breath, uncurling his hand from around the stem of the wineglass as unobtrusively as he could. No one had noticed — they were all still caught up in their conversation, reminiscing over something that… he didn’t remember her name, but evidently whatever had happened between her and someone from HR was enough to have the table laughing and ribbing her about it as she told the story. He was alone in his revelation, and never more grateful for it.

His skin itched with the urge to look, to turn his head. He wasn’t going to fool himself that he didn’t know exactly where he’d find him — even if he hadn’t zeroed in on the exact direction his laughter had come from just a moment ago, he hadn’t been able to help taking stock of where his and Margo’s table was when James had pulled him along to see his old work friends. He stiffened as he heard it again, joined this time with Margo’s, and was thrown right back to sitting around their usual table in the school cafeteria, getting shushed in the library, smoking joints beneath the bleachers.

He’d never been someone who looked back at high school as a terrible experience to be forgotten, or the only good time of his life that he clung to. It hadn’t been free of drama and heartbreak and… an uncomfortable puberty, if he were honest, but. But Eliot and Margo had been fierce in their support and their friendship and — yeah, okay, their love for him, and for the first time in years, he felt a longing to be right back in senior year, the three of them ready to take on the world together.

He’d found something similar with James, and Julia had been by his side through everything. But he was about to leave all of that behind, too.

His glass was empty and the open bottle on the table dry. He looked up to see James and Fen standing to head back to the bridal table and, not wanting to sit awkwardly with people he didn’t really know and no alcohol, he made his excuses as well. The wait staff had been attentive at the bridal table all night but the bar was closer, the line small, and his need for a drink high so he made his way there instead. Setting his empty glass on the bar, he asked for a red instead, leaning his elbow on the counter as he waited for the bartender to pour.

“Well, if it isn’t King Nerd himself.”

The smirk was clear in her voice, and Quentin was already grinning when he turned around. Margo stood a few feet away, her hip cocked and her arms loosely crossed. She arched an elegant eyebrow at him “Are you just gonna stare at me like an asshole, or —”

And just like that, it was as though no time had passed between them at all. Laughing, he stepped forward, catching the way her face softened into a genuine smile before he wrapped his arms around her, and the hug he got in return was surprisingly tight.

It didn't really hit him, not until this moment, just how much he'd missed _Margo_. She and Eliot had been a package deal, and he'd been convinced for a while that she never would have looked at him twice if it hadn't been for his relationship with Eliot. Maybe that was true, but somehow he'd ended up with a fierce friend. He'd been so caught up in stressing over the fact that Eliot was here tonight and what might happen it he spoke to him, that he hadn't given that much thought to how it might feel to see Margo.

Good. It felt _good._

When she pulled back, Quentin dropped his arms reluctantly. She nodded over his shoulder at the bar behind him. “What’s it take to get a guy to buy a girl a drink around here?”

The smirk was back, but her eyes warm as she looked up at him. He remembered being _terrified_ of her — and didn't fool himself into thinking that he wouldn't be again if he put a toe wrong. Or, if she wanted to make him think he had. For now, he let himself enjoy being happy to see her again. “It’s an open bar, Margo," he pointed out, well aware that she knew that.

“So it should be easy for you, then.”

Rolling his eyes at her, Quentin turned back to the bar, where his drink was waiting for him, and signalled the bartender for another. Margo stepped up to lean against the bar opposite him, tilting her head as she gave him an obvious once over. "I always knew you'd clean up nice when someone else was allowed to do it for you."

He let the dig at his personal style slide, didn't want to get into an argument about his wardrobe. The jeans he wore these days were at least a better fit than what he'd worn in his school, but he was willing to bet that it still wouldn't be up to her standards. "You're just put out that I never let you give me a makeover."

Margo shook her head, smiling at him wryly. "I like this whole man bun look on you," she said, and he caught his hand halfway to tucking his hair behind his ear despite it not even being in his face. "It's cute."

"Yeah, well." He looked her over, trying to find something about her to call cute and coming up blank. "You're… even more gorgeous than you were at school," he said, immediately feeling like an idiot for just blurting that out, but she just smirked at him again.

"I know," she said with a shrug, and he shook his head, unable to believe just how _Margo_ she was. Taking her glass from the bar with a wink at the bartender, she slipped her other arm through his and pulled him back towards the tables.

He’d thought that they were heading back to the bridal table. Maybe she was going to come up and say hi to Julia (and James — did _she_ know James?), or maybe she was going to walk with him halfway before breaking away to head back to her seat, but she _definitely_ wasn’t going to steer him right toward her table until that was suddenly exactly what she was doing. He didn’t want to look like he was _looking_ for Eliot so he didn’t look at all, turning to her instead. “Margo,” he said warningly. He was absolutely sure she knew exactly what she was doing.

“Oh, suck it up,” she said cheerfully, only proving him right, and then he couldn’t say a single other word about it because Margo was lowering herself into her seat and pulling him down forcefully into the one beside her.

Except Eliot wasn’t here. Eliot was — he looked around at the familiar faces of James’s drama club friends, around at the surrounding tables, up at — _oh_. Eliot was sitting at _his _seat at the bridal table, talking to Julia and James and —

And that’s fine, that’s totally fine, that’s great.

“I’m sure you lovely folks know Quentin,” Margo said, and he tore his eyes away from the way Eliot was leaning across Julia, gesturing emphatically as he spoke to her and James, and made himself focus on the people at the table. They chorused hello with differing levels of enthusiasm, and he returned the greeting with a sideways glare at Margo, who only smiled at him innocently. “James’s friends have been entertaining us all night with stories about James from drama club.”

Drama club — Quentin snorted, and then panicked for a moment until he saw answering grins on most of the group’s faces. James _had _joined a drama club in college, dragging him along for the first few sessions, but it had quickly dissolved from drama games and improv skits to getting drunk every Friday night after their last classes for the week. He wasn’t sure how long it had been since they’d had any drama other than the drama they _caused._ Quentin had tagged along every now and then, but James hadn’t pressured him, knowing that his idea of winding down after a long week was a quiet night in with a book instead of a rowdy night out.

Still, he liked this group of people a lot, and wasn’t surprised that James had sat them with Margo and Eliot. He felt more comfortable engaging with them than he did James’s old work friends — they were great people, he was sure, but he had more in common with this group, and they knew him as more than just James and Fen’s friend.

Just as though he’d summoned her with the thought, Fen appeared at the table and sank into the spare seat beside Rafe. “Drama club!” she cheered, raising her glass.

There was something in Fen’s smile when she met his eye across the table, and Quentin wondered whether she knew who Eliot was to him. Had she and James been talking about him and Eliot when they returned to their table? Had they been talking about him and Eliot _to Eliot?_ He resisted the urge to look up at the table again, to see if they were looking about him, to see… yeah okay, just to see him.

“It’s good to see you again, Margo,” Fen said with a wave and a quick glance towards Quentin and yep, someone had told her _something_.

“How do you two know each other?” Benedict asked, looking between Quentin and Margo. “Through James?”

Quentin stiffened in his chair, not ready for the group to pile on him if Margo or even Fen burst out with the specifics of the situation. “I, uh — hmm. We went to school together?” he said, cringing internally at the way he somehow made it into a question.

"Oh, you must know Eliot as well then!” Todd’s whole face had lit up as he made that connection. “So crazy, that they didn't realise they were all the same friends from school until they flew home!"

Because of course they’d probably had the group hanging on every word as soon as the ‘how do you know the couple?’ question had come up. And apparently he’d been left out of that story, which was… was it something? He wasn’t sure. "Yeah,” he said distractedly. “Crazy."

He tried not to look at Margo but found his eyes darting towards her anyway, and of course she was watching him, a curious smile on her face. “You’re fucking adorable,” she said fondly, before turning back to the others. "So we all know, Quentin, good," she said. "Who's going to tell me all of the embarrassing things I've missed out on?"

"Or we could not do that," he said quickly, a montage of every stupid thing he'd done over the last ten years flashing through his mind.

"Honey, it's either that, or I start telling _them_ stories." He started to protest, but she was already talking over him, her eyes lit up as she turned to the others. "Oh! Has he ever told you all about the time we all played strip poker?"

A groan echoed around the table, and Quentin grinned. Most of this group had been at James's bachelor party, or else played cards with him at another time in the past. "Let me guess," Fen said. "He had everyone down to their socks in five minutes. And then took all their money," she added with a pointed look, which he pretended not to notice.

Margo leaned back in her chair, obviously enjoying the attention as she settled in to tell her story. Quentin relaxed as well — there were worse things she could talk about, although he remained wary of exactly what she might bring up along the way. "Emily was throwing a house party, and —"

"Wait, I thought it was at Eric's?"

"You're both wrong." The way that his heart did a flip at the smooth, amused voice contrasted with the scrape of chair legs on the wooden floor, and Quentin somehow managed to keep his movements slow and deliberate and _normal_ as he looked up to see Eliot slip into the chair on Margo's other side.

He didn't look at him. Well, he did, but only in the same way as he cast his eyes over the test of the group before his eyes landed on Margo. His lips were turned into a smile that was almost indulgent, his arm slung loosely over the back of Margo's chair. It felt like he was playing for their little audience, with his whole focus on Margo. Quentin remembered so many moments just like this. He remembered being the person included in Eliot's dramatics, feeling both lucky to be on the receiving end of that focus, and that he was completely ruining it. The fact that Eliot hadn't cared, not even once, was the part that had mattered.

"It was Camille,” Eliot continued, raising his eyebrows at the immediate recollection on Margo’s face. “And I'm personally offended that you don't remember that, considering all of the time and effort Q and I spent trying to set the two of you up in the first place."

He'd forgotten about that too — he and Eliot had spent at least two weeks planting the idea in Camille's head, that she needed to throw a party on the weekend that her parents were away. It hadn’t taken a lot to lead her to that decision, but they’d patted themselves on the back for it afterwards anyway. And after all of their efforts, she'd never even told them if it had paid off. "Please tell me she finally admitted what happened that night," he said, looking past Margo to Eliot.

Eliot eyed him appraisingly for a moment before turning to Margo, and — and yeah, okay, he felt a thrill at just apparently _jumping right into this_ like no time had passed, but mostly it just felt so wonderfully normal. He followed Eliot’s gaze to Margo, who lifted her shoulder in a shrug. “A lady doesn't kiss and tell.”

“Since when has that stopped you?” Eliot said, moving his hand forward to flick a strand of hair off of her shoulder.

The look she sent him was pure smugness. “Fine. I gave her three orgasms before I had to come and find you two and haul outta there. Anyway,” she said, waving off Ess’s light applause. “Camille was having a party, and everyone was tipsy at the least, and someone had the great idea that we were going to play strip poker.”

“That someone wasn’t me,” Quentin said, already anticipating the question, and Benedict closed his mouth.

“It wasn’t Quentin,” Margo continued, turning to look at him as she spoke. “But that didn’t mean little nerd boy here wasn’t all worked up about showing off how good he was with a pack of cards.”

“Half of the group was half naked in fifteen minutes,” Eliot said. “And Q?”

“Fully clothed, from head to toe.”

“He wasn’t even cheating.”

They bounced off of each other like they’d rehearsed it, and Quentin might have thought they actually had if he hadn’t seen first hand just how in sync they were. He felt full up with warmth, at the knowledge that the two of them appeared just as close as they had been back at school. He couldn’t imagine a world where Eliot and Margo weren’t _Eliot and Margo_, and somehow that made everything seem a little more steady.

_He_ felt steady. This was _easy_. The familiar banter, somehow still second nature despite not seeing them for so many years, soothed the rough edges of the anxiety that he’d held onto throughout the night, and the warm smile that Eliot gave him calmed him even more. For the first time all night, this felt uncomplicated. “I don’t need to cheat at cards,” he said, grinning because, well, he _had_, that night.

“I’m still not convinced —” Todd started, but cut off when Fen bumped him with her shoulder.

“So Quentin was starting to feel left out,” Margo continued. “Everyone around him was dropping clothes like it was the middle of summer, and poor Q was still buttoned up all prim and proper.”

“And then all of a sudden, Quentin starts to lose,” Eliot said. His fingers were playing around the stem of his wine glass idly as he spoke to the group. “One round, and the next, and the next, until he’s down to his underwear and his Pokemon socks.”

It had been so long since he’d thought of that night, but now that he did he could remember it vividly. He’d felt so smug about winning, about being able to show off one of the things that he was actually really objectively good at, that he hadn’t realised straight away that winning meant that he was the only person keeping his clothes on in a group of tipsy seniors. His smugness at playing so well had started to dissolve once Eliot had decided to lose his pants before his shirt, and he’d gotten distracted by the long lines of his pale legs.

It hadn’t been until he’d started worrying about getting caught staring at his boyfriend that he’d noticed just how intently everyone else was eyeing each other, and. And maybe he’d wanted everyone to see Eliot looking at him like that, too. Maybe he’d just been a bit drunk and had wanted to join in on the silly, safe-dangerous feel of the game.

So he’d started to lose on purpose.

He hadn’t been ashamed of it then, and wasn’t now. He grinned at the others, feeling light in the moment. “I didn’t want to miss out on the, um. The _experience_,” he said.

“Of course not, sweetie,” Margo said, reaching out to pat his hand. “And it didn’t matter _at all_ that both of us and Julia saw straight through you. And you came to your senses before you ended up completely naked in a room full of people that you’d have to still spend every day with for another two months.”

And thank god for that. He’d gone from feeling brave to feeling awkward and embarrassed in the blink of an eye, once he realised that _holy shit you’re sitting in your underwear where everyone can see you_. But the look in Eliot’s eyes as he’d blatantly looked him up and down had quickly erased — well, _most_ of his panic.

“I still remember Stoppard doing a naked lap around the living room like it was yesterday,” Margo said wistfully, leaning back in her chair and looking skyward as though she could see it now. After a moment she seemed to remember the rest of them were there and straightened in her chair. “It wasn’t long after that that Camille and I… oh right, it _was_ at Camille’s house.”

The smattering of laughter that sounded around the table seemed to please Margo, and her eyes were warm as she raised her glass and took a slow sip, watching him over the rim. His mind was foggy with the part that she’d left out.

Eliot’s eyes raking over him through the last few rounds of the game, his hand grabbing his and pulling him to his feet as soon as everyone started cheering Stoppard on for his loser’s lap, a scramble to grab their clothes and then they were falling into — a goddamn _closet_, but that was fine, anything was fine as long as the door was closed and Eliot’s mouth was on his, his hands his body his _tongue_, and he was still trembling with aftershocks when Margo threw the door open to announce that it was time to leave.

He knew without a doubt that Margo was thinking about _exactly _that moment right now.

He didn’t dare look at Eliot.

Apparently their story reminded Ess about some house party that he and his cousin Idri had thrown, and with everyone’s attention on him, Quentin let his linger on Eliot, watching him out of the corner of his eye once he was sure that he wasn’t watching _him_.

Eliot looked… he looked incredible. His hair was longer, the line of his jaw stronger, and when he glanced down at Margo, his smile lit up his whole face. The two of them had been as outwardly confident as anyone could be at seventeen, but it sat on them both better now, like that surety and confidence they’d worked so hard for back then now sank bone deep. He knew better than to think that was true, but watching them now, looking so wonderfully relaxed and happy and just — enjoying the night, it made him feel good to think that maybe life was treating them well and they were happy.

He’d thought, an hour ago and years ago, that maybe he’d feel good if he knew that they were miserable without him. Like he was loved, like he mattered. But, he realised now, that any desire to be important to either of these people paled in comparison to them just _being happy_ with however their lives had turned out.

Margo glanced across at him again, and he felt the warmth of familiarity in her eyes. Yeah, okay — it mattered to him if he still mattered to her. He looked at Eliot, at the small smile playing around his lips as he listened to Ess, at the amused look he sent Margo, at the way his eyes softened a little when they passed over Quentin.

He’d built up _Eliot and Margo_ in his head so much in the last few hours that he’d forgotten that they were just people — people who had real lives and real thoughts and whose lives didn’t revolve around what Quentin had been doing over the last ten years. Just like he had a whole life now that didn’t revolve around them. Around Eliot.

They were just two people at a wedding. Two people who used to know each other, and it didn’t have to be weird.

Ess had been distracted by something Rafe had asked him, and Quentin jumped into the moment, feeling brave. Slinging his arm over the back of his chair, he twisted in his seat to face Margo and Eliot. “How the hell did you not realise whose wedding you were going to?”

He knew how James hadn’t put it together that Quentin’s ex-boyfriend Eliot and Eliot from drama club during high school — he only made the connection now, how poetic it was that he’d been seated with James’s ‘_drama club’_ — were the same person, but he couldn’t imagine how it wouldn’t even occur to Eliot that it was more than a coincidence when James must have mentioned his girlfriend turned fiance from his hometown.

Smiling ruefully as though he knew exactly where Quentin’s train of thought had led, Eliot glanced up in the direction of the dance floor for a long moment before turning back to him. “Would you believe me if I said it just never occurred to me? Even if I’d made the connection that you knew each other — James, good enough for our Julia?”

Quentin turned his head to look across at the dance floor, where Julia and James were laughing so hard as they moved together that they were practically holding each other up. He didn’t think it was possible to look happier as the two of them did in that moment. “I’d say I’m still not sure he is, but… James is a good guy.”

Eliot’s eyes were thoughtful when Quentin looked back to him, and he wondered if he was thinking anything close to what he was. That _Eliot_, of all people, had ended up knowing someone who was so important to him, and no one had realised. After a moment he nodded. “That he is,” he agreed, raising his glass in salute, and Quentin was more than happy to drink to that.

The scrape of chairs pulled his attention away, and Quentin raised his eyes to see Fen and the others getting to their feet. “We’re going to check out the photo booth,” Benedict said.

“Come, come with us,” Fen said, dancing around the table and grabbing Margo’s arm, and Quentin was surprised when she let herself be pulled to her feet. “Are you coming?” she asked Eliot, and… okay, he wasn’t put out that she’d asked Eliot and not him, _not at all_, but —

“You guys go ahead,” Eliot said, and he was imagining the look he exchanged with Margo, right?

Fen finally turned her questioning eyes to him, and, well — he couldn’t just leave Eliot here by himself, could he? “We’ll get photos later,” he promised her, and then she and Margo and — yep, everyone else at the table just… left, and he was…

Alone with Eliot. Which. Great.

Had it really only been five minutes since he’s decided that this wasn’t weird?

Eliot wasn’t looking at him, but he wasn’t _not_ looking at him either, which was great because Quentin suddenly lost all concept of where he should look or what he should say or what he should do. “So,” he said, just to break the silence that had started to stretch out between them, immediately kicking himself because _what the hell are you following that up with, you idiot?_

“So,” Eliot said, his fingers encircling his empty wine glass again, rocking it back and forth slightly. After a moment he stopped, staring at the glass for a moment before glancing across at Quentin’s, and then the bottle of red in the middle of the table. “Wine?”

“Oh god, please.”

He caught the quick quirk of Eliot's lips as he reached for the bottle, pouring for Quentin before filling his own glass. Quentin took a sip, just for something to do. Should he have gone with the others? No, he could do this. "So, um. It's good to see you?" he said, and goddamn why did it have to come out like a question?

Leaning back in his chair, Eliot regarded him over the rim of his glass, openly smiling at him when he set it down on the table. "I'm not here to mess with your head, Q." Inhaling sharply, he opened his mouth to deny that he was doing any such thing, and then deflated when he realised that after all this time, Eliot could still see straight through him. Eliot's smile widened as he nodded up towards the dance floor. "Tell me about Julia. I feel like I know more about James's girlfriend than I do about our Jules."

The fact that Eliot knew 'James's girlfriend Julia' at all was still struggling to make sense to him. Talking about Julia was safe. He could talk about Julia. "We'll, she's a lawyer now. And — did you hear she just got married?"

"Oh, really?"

He told him a little about Julia's work, about how the two of them had met James, about the vacation the three of them had taken when James had proposed. Realising that he probably cared just as much about James’s side of the story as he did about Julia’s, he made sure to tell him how James had been so completely sure of himself… right up until the day he’d planned to ask her, and then had chickened out in the moment and ended up asking her in their hotel room over breakfast two days later.

The skin around Eliot’s eyes crinkled when he laughed. Quentin wondered how different he was, too, but didn’t let himself dwell on it as Eliot told him about one time where James had been in LA for work and they’d caught up for drinks, and ended up drunk calling Julia in the middle of the night because he missed her. “Yeah, they are… almost painfully adorable,” Quentin said.

“There’s no almost about it,” Eliot said, then nodded towards him. “How about you? James told me that you’re an English teacher? Could you _be_ any more predictable?”

His smile softened the barb into a tease, and Quentin felt a flush of… something, that Eliot felt comfortable enough with whatever this was to joke with him like this. But then, Eliot had never shied away from things like that. “I like working with the kids,” he said, smiling automatically when he thought of the young lives who he hoped he could have any positive impact on. “Someone has to teach them which of the classics are great and which ones are trash. And then, to ignore what anyone else thinks and just like what you like anyway,” he added.

His smile faded when he remembered that he’d be leaving all of that behind in just a few weeks. He’d handed in his resignation. He hadn’t found out until the break that he’d been accepted, and he regretted not having the chance to say goodbye to a few kids in particular, kids who reminded him of himself when he was younger. But this was a good thing — maybe he could help more young queer nerds this way, just like Rupert Chatwin had helped young queer him.

_Oh my god, could you be any more pretentious right now?_

He… he wanted to tell Eliot about it. Eliot would know how important it was to him. Even after all this time, he _knew_ that he would understand what this particular opportunity meant to him. But the assignment of the writer’s residency scholarship wasn’t going to be announced until he was in New York to be introduced, and he wasn’t allowed to talk about it before then. The only reason why Julia knew was because she’d been the one to push him to apply for it. And, well. Rules or no rules, he couldn’t _not_ tell Julia.

The same logic couldn’t be applied to his ex boyfriend from ten years ago, but… “I’ve been writing again,” he said. It felt almost like a confession, and because of more than just the secrecy about the residency — his love for fantasy and adventure and imagination hadn’t been a secret to anyone who knew him for more than five minutes, but the details of his writing was something he’d always held closer to his chest. It was intimidating, pouring a part of yourself onto the page. But the way Eliot’s eyes lit up sent a thrill through him. “I — uh, stopped writing for a while because, you know, life, but… I’ve been seriously writing again and. And I feel pretty good about it.”

Admitting that was as big a revelation as anything else. He felt like maybe he was actually good at this. That he could do something with it. He knew that in ten minute’s time he’d be drowning in self doubt again, but the fact that he knew, sometimes, that maybe he was good at putting down words and making people feel things put a set in his shoulders, a lift in his chin, and he let the delight on Eliot’s face warm him through. “I can’t say I’m surprised,” he said. “You were writing novels in the middle of second period when half the class couldn’t string two words together.” He paused, his teeth pulling at his bottom lip. “Remember the poetry you wrote?”

Quentin cringed. “I try very, very hard not to remember the poetry I wrote.”

“It was good,” Eliot said, entirely unconvincingly.

“How about you?” Quentin said, determinedly changing the subject. “How’s Hollywood?”

Eliot watched him silently for a few seconds, and he was just starting to wish he could call the words back when he reached between them for the wine bottle. Quentin hadn’t even noticed that his glass was empty again, and he murmured his thanks when Eliot topped it up. “Hollywood… was,” Eliot said slowly, and of course he’d just gone and stuck his foot in something that was clearly a sore subject. Except Eliot didn’t _look_ annoyed by it, more wistful and… rueful? “Margo and I had all of these grand plans when we left. Margo told me that she’d cover me, but her dad’s money was going to dry up at some point. I got a job working behind a bar to pay for my share of the shitty apartment we rented, and I spent my time working and auditioning and drinking. Rinse, repeat. ”

“Sounds…” Tiring. “Exciting?”

Eliot huffed a laugh, humourlessly. “It was exhausting. You go to audition after audition, trying to be bigger and better and more original than everyone else, and then sit by the phone for the callback that’s never going to come.” He paused. “I liked the work at the bar, though. I was good at it, and not just the mixing and the pouring and the atmosphere. After a few months the owner, Henry, started putting me on more and more shifts, and then teaching me some of how the business side of things worked. All of a sudden I was helping him run the place. And then he died.”

“Oh.” Eliot’s eyes were on the table in front of him, his fingers tracing back and forth around the base of his glass. Quentin shifted in his seat, wanting to reach out to him, not knowing if he should. “I’m sorry.”

Raising his eyes again, Eliot smiled at him faintly. “It was a long time ago. Seven years, next February. He had a heart attack. And he didn’t have any family, so he left the bar to me.”

There was a sadness in his eyes that told Quentin immediately just how hard that had hit him. He thought he understood how complicated a feeling that must have been, to be handed something like that at the loss of… a friend? A mentor? Either way, he saw the feeling in Eliot’s eyes and knew not to try and smooth it over. That wasn’t his place. “He must have had a lot of faith in you,” he said, and hoped he wasn’t making it worse again.

Surprise, then uncertainty and something that was entirely more complicated but might have been close to pride passed over Eliot’s face. “He had more faith in me than I had in myself,” he said slowly. “When I found out —” A riot of laughter broke out behind Quentin, and Eliot’s eyes darted up toward it momentarily, but Quentin didn’t turn away from him. When Eliot’s eyes dropped back to him, he watched as he started to retreat back behind a wall, before he let it slip away.

A small part inside him felt good, that he still knew his tells as well.

“It was more than I deserved,” Eliot continued. “More than I was worth. More than his trust in me. I didn’t want to take it. I was sure I’d fuck it up, like I fucked up...” He paused, shook his head. “Margo was the one who convinced me that Henry wouldn’t have left it to me if he didn’t think I could do it. I didn’t believe her straight away, but that just made me more determined to prove myself wrong, and him right in the decision he’d made. I stopped auditioning and started being a real life adult,” he said, shuddering dramatically for effect.

“And how did that go?” Quentin asked, hoping that he read Eliot correctly in that he was leading up to something that was either a happy ending or a good story or a little bit of both.

Eliot regarded him for a moment before leaning back in his chair, gesturing dismissively with his glass. The corner of his lips twitched up into a smile. “The bar is doing well. So well, in fact, that I now own a second bar in LA, and a third in New York.”

_And there it is_. Quentin pressed his lips together to try and keep his expression straight, knowing that the full extent of the pride swelling in him was disproportionate to what was probably appropriate. “Of course you do,” he said. “You never did do things by halves.”

And wasn’t that true. Most of the things that they’d gotten up to when they were younger were thanks to Eliot or Margo’s need to always go higher bigger better. There was no more flying under the radar, not once he’d had them in his life. Even after they’d left.

“What’s the fun in that?” Eliot said. He started to raise his glass to his lips, then lifted it in Quentin’s direction instead. “To you and me, then. Being two real life successful adults.”

There was so much doubt in his voice that Quentin had to laugh. The older he got, the more he felt like adulthood was always half a step more out of reach. Maybe Eliot felt the same. Either way — “_You’re_ a successful real life person,” he said. “Most of my success is in my head.” And in a dozen or two semi-coherent thoughts in the notes app on his phone.

Eliot raised his eyebrows, looking at him pointedly, and all at once it came crashing back to him, that this was _Eliot, _that Eliot was here. God, he looked beautiful, a lock of hair breaking away from the rest to fall over his forehead, that half-smile playing around his lips. There was nothing teasing or wary on his face now, just… softness, and surety. “That’s where it matters, Q.”

His mouth dry and his chest tight, he took a long drink from his glass, blatantly avoiding answering that because… what _was_ he supposed to say to that? He wasn't sure if Eliot noticed or if he felt the same way, but he steered the conversation back with a deliberate casualness that Quentin recognised easily. "Margo booked a job off Broadway, and I found someone wanting to sell. I went with her to help her get settled in and get the new location set up, but then —"

“Hey, have either of you seen — oh, there it is!” Annoyance flickered over Eliot’s face, and Quentin followed his gaze to see Todd on the other side of the table, holding his phone up in triumph. “I thought I lost it in the props for the photo booth, but then Margo kicked me out, so I figured I’d check here. There are so many props. You should go check it out! There’s those speech bubble things, and hats and feather boas and masks and —”

“Sounds great,” Eliot said, rushing forward and topping Quentin’s glass up with wine until it was full almost to the top, and the bottle was empty. “Oh no,” he said with faux surprise. “It looks like we’re out. While you’re up, Todd, do you mind hunting us down another one?”

“Sure! I can do that.” Completely oblivious and happy to help, Todd took the empty bottle and headed in the direction of the bar.

Quentin watched him go for a few seconds before turning back to Eliot, who was still holding a straight face. “You put it on maybe _just a little_ too much,” he said, holding his thumb and his forefinger millimetres apart.

Eliot’s face finally relaxed, lifting his eyes skyward for a moment before shrugging. “It worked, didn’t it? Is he always this much?” He nodded towards Quentin’s drink, and he obliged him, lifting the glass carefully so as not to spill it all over himself and god, why did he have to pour it all into_ his_ glass? His head wasn’t quite spinning, but he felt light and bubbly and he should probably slow down a little. The thought of making an idiot out of himself in front of Eliot made him set his glass firmly back on the table.

“Anyway,” Eliot continued, with a glance over his shoulder to the bar. When he looked back to Quentin, he reined in his smile, not wanting Eliot to think he was laughing at him. His frustration with Todd, of all people, _was_ amusing. Todd was harmless. Quentin stopped thinking about Todd entirely at the small smile that played around Eliot’s lips when his eyes landed on him again. He’d settled back in his seat again, one arm hanging over the back of Margo’s chair while nursing his wine in the other. “Who’d have thought we’d end up here, right?”

Did… it matter to Eliot, that they were here together? Did it matter to him, if it mattered? Quentin swallowed down the lump in his throat. “What, running into each other ten years later at Julia’s wedding?”

The corner of Eliot’s lips twitched. “Yeah, that too.”

The two of them fell silent, and… there was something there, right? He wasn’t going crazy. Something in the way Eliot watched him, in the way that Quentin’s chest was starting to tighten. His eyes darted over Eliot’s face, taking in everything, everything that he’d let sink to the bottom of his thoughts as the years had passed. He dove into them now, caught not in a specific moment but just in the general feeling of being loved by him.

They’d been so _happy_ together. Why hadn’t he been strong enough to fight for it?

He should have tried harder. They’d had something far too special to just let it slip through his fingers, and now that he was confronted with that, now that Eliot was here, the least he could do was apologise. Had Eliot assumed Quentin thought he wasn’t worth fighting for? He hoped that, like him, he hadn’t been dwelling on it every second of every day for the past ten years, but he wanted to clear the air anyway. “El, I —”

“Quentin!” A hand grabbed his arm, and he tore his eyes away from Eliot’s questioning look to see Fen, grinning as she tugged on him. “Come dance with us, you _have_ to,” she said, laughing as she skipped past him in the direction of the dance floor, leading Margo by the hand. Margo looked… a lot less unimpressed with the situation than he would have expected.

Shaking his head at them, he turned back to Eliot… and paused, when he saw that Eliot was still watching him. “What?” he asked, the word slipping out before he could stop himself.

Tilting his head at him consideringly, Eliot hesitated a moment more before he got to his feet and held his hand out, palm up. Quentin stared at his long fingers, wondering if he still played piano. Wondering… other things. “Shall we?”

Forcing his eyes back up, he felt a pang of wonder, followed quickly by nervousness, at just how stupidly elegant he looked, from the perfectly styled curl in his hair to his perfectly matching shirt, vest, tie combination. This was a terrible idea, he knew — there was no way he could make it through this without saying something dumb or looking like an idiot. Half an hour ago he’d been in a panic about even speaking to him, and now Eliot wanted to _dance?_ What was even happening tonight?

“Eliot,” he said doubtfully.

“Come on.” Eliot arched an eyebrow at him. “I dare you.”

_Cheater_. Trying not to think too hard about it, Quentin put his hand over Eliot’s, dropping his eyes to watch his fingers curl around his so he could pull him to his feet.

Eliot’s hand stayed wrapped around his, and the two of them weaved between tables in the direction of the dance floor. Fen and Margo were dancing in a group with Kady, Benedict and Josh, and Quentin followed Eliot over to them, determinedly ignoring the wink that Fen sent him when she caught sight of them. It wasn’t anything, it was just dancing, and he didn’t care whether she thought otherwise. Except he absolutely cared what everyone thought, but he was going to do it anyway.

Eliot came to a stop beside the others, and was just turning toward Quentin when the upbeat song ended and the opening notes of something slower filled the room. He was perfectly ready to just head back to his seat, but Eliot just shrugged amicably, adjusting his grip on Quentin’s hand and reaching for his waist with the other and, okay, they were doing this, this was fine. “Is this okay?” Eliot asked, his voice quiet in his ear.

Belatedly, Quentin realised that he’d just been standing there. Mentally giving himself a shake, he lifted his hand to Eliot’s shoulder and forced his knees to unlock. “It’s fine,” he said, moving slowly back and forth and staring very deliberately at the embroidered detail on Eliot’s vest.

He just. He hadn’t expected to be so _close_ to him.

He made himself focus on moving his feet, on following Eliot’s lead as they moved together, on breathing in and out. After thirty seconds or so, he felt Eliot turn his head. “You’re not stumbling everywhere.”

“Maybe I learned how to dance,” he said, risking a glance up at him when he realised how defensively the words came out, but Eliot only huffed a laugh and —

And pulled him closer.

His world narrowed down to every point that they touched. His shoulder, firm beneath his fingers. Eliot’s hand, warm and firm in his, his other wrapped around his waist. He was grateful that he’d left his suit jacket hanging over the back of his chair, and felt silly for being glad for it. He was hyper aware of every movement that he made, of the steady rise and fall of his chest, of the delicate cedar scent of his cologne. He'd forgotten… how tall…

Was it hot in here, or was it just him?

He turned his head, sucked in a deep breath, felt Eliot’s hand squeeze around his, bringing it in close so that they rested between their chests. Eliot’s thumb stroked over his knuckles, just as his other hand trailed up his back to press his fingers into his shoulders, and… yeah, okay, his shoulders were starting to ache with the amount of tension he’d been holding in them, so what? The knead of Eliot’s fingers into his skin was a reminder that he’d have felt too embarrassed to acknowledge head-on.

He felt Eliot’s breath let out when he relaxed them, his hand smoothing down to rest on his lower back. Which — that held him slightly closer than before, and that… was fine. That was good. He was fine.

He definitely _wasn’t _thinking about the last time they’d danced like this (or not like this — if he thought he was awkward _now_), back at prom when they’d already had a potential long distance relationship on their minds. They’d held each other close half the night, barely even pretending to dance, before bailing an hour in and going back to Quentin’s place.

Eliot’s hand tightened around his, and he squeezed back.

Turning them slightly, Eliot cleared his throat before he spoke, nodding over to a woman standing on the side of the dance floor, talking to a group of people. “That’s James’s cousin, right? Do you think anyone’s told her that she’s wearing the same dress as Julia’s grandmother? Or that Nanna Wicker pulls it off _so _much better?”

All semblance of grace gone, Quentin pushed on Eliot until they were facing the other direction, so that if James’s cousin heard him laughing, she wouldn’t have any reason to think it was him. And, well, he wasn’t _wrong_. Biting on his lips to muffle his laughter, he finally looked up at Eliot, and found him grinning at him. "You're terrible."

"You're pronouncing 'delightful' wrong."

Quentin risked a glance back over to James's cousin, and breathed easier when it didn't appear that she'd noticed them. He hadn't recognised her, but he didn't feel bad for it — he didn't know James's extended family as well as he knew Julia's. Apparently Eliot did. “I can’t believe you knew James before I knew James. My whole life is a lie.”

Eliot regarded him solemnly. “I wasn’t going to tell you this, but… you deserve the truth. I’m really a secret agent for the —”

“Oh my god, shut up.”

Laughing, Eliot pulled him back in, and Quentin finally relaxed.

The song ended to the sound of Josh tapping on the microphone, and when the two of them parted to face him, Quentin’s hand felt cold with the absence of Eliot’s hand in his. He flexed his fingers, and hoped Eliot didn't notice. “All right, all right, all right,” Josh said, his voice sounding through the speakers as the chatter in the room started to die down. “I need every single person up here on the dance floor for the bouquet toss! Nope, Penny, you’re not going anywhere, dudes deserve flowers too. Rafe, I don’t think Abigail — you know what, I’m staying out of that. You do you, my friend. Come on, come on, get your asses up here.”

Quentin shifted his weight, intending for his quick exit to be covered by the other people crowding the dance floor, but an arm slipped through his before he could move. Kady’s expression was bemused, and her grip on his arm tight, holding him in place. “If I have to be up here, you have to be up here.”

There was an itch under his skin, called 'you've only just found your calm tonight, participating in wedding traditions where you'll be judged for being enthusiastic _and_ for being disinterested is not a good idea for _calm_'. The thought of making a big deal about it only made the discomfort worse. “Or, we could both run," he said, keeping his tone hopeful instead. He could play it off lightly and still mean it.

Shaking her head, she made a sound of denial in the back of her throat. “Julia threatened me, so no, we’re doing this.”

He was pretty sure that Julia was the only one who could get away with threatening Kady. Turning to his other side, he found Eliot still standing there, and he shrugged as though to say ‘sure, why not?’

On the other side of the dance floor, Julia waved her bouquet in the air, calling something out that he didn’t quite catch to someone off to the side. Turning her back to them, she raised it once, twice, before throwing it backwards into the crowd.

The bouquet flew high into the air before arching down, bouncing off of the eager fingers of the women in front of him and right into Quentin’s hands.

He — he hadn’t meant to reach for it, but it had fallen right in his direction and he’d lifted his hands in reflex against the thing flying at his face, except his hands were now closed around it, and —_ no._ He scrambled to throw it back into the crowd.

_Oh god._

Most of the group were cheering the person who had caught the bouquet — Quentin didn’t know them — but he could see Julia clinging to James’s arm, practically bent over laughing. “Well done, Q,” Kady said, her voice sarcastic in a good natured sort of way, and when she bumped into his shoulder it swayed him into — oh god, Eliot. He turned toward him before he could stop himself, and found Eliot grinning at him.

“It’s nice to see some things never change,” Eliot said, almost like a question, and the floor could split down the middle to swallow him up _at any time_. A moment later his hand settled on Quentin’s shoulder, squeezing comfortingly, and Quentin’s heart did something funny in his chest, something embarrassed and nervous and exhilarated all at once.

And yeah — okay, he could not be any more ridiculous if he tried, and he could feel his skin flushing hot, but Eliot’s hand on him, the way Julia beamed at him from across the room, the just right amount of tipsy washed the edge of his discomfort away.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Quentin and Eliot spend some time together.

Julia’s silence was deafening, and Quentin paused with his spoonful of wedding cake halfway to his mouth. Alarm rising in him quickly, he turned to stare at Julia, his eyes wide. “Julia. You’re not throwing me a surprise goodbye party. _Right?_”

“Of course not,” Julia said dismissively, except… except she was way too good at saying that she wasn’t going to do things like that and then doing the very thing that she promised him she wasn’t going to do.

He didn’t want to have to remind her that it was a _secret_, that he couldn’t talk about it. Glancing sideways to make sure that Kady hadn’t found her way back to her seat just yet, he turned back to Julia. “I don’t want a party,” he said for what felt like the fiftieth time. “I just want to spend a few days with the two of you and have some downtime while you stop me from freaking out about moving to a city where I don’t know anyone.” Joking about this very real worry made it okay, right?

He already felt bad enough that they were cutting their honeymoon short because he was leaving. Not that they’d ever _said_ that they weren’t taking as much time as they wanted, but it seemed like an awful coincidence that they were flying home from Maui with enough time to spend a few days with him before he left for twelve months. “You know that if you ended up spending the whole two weeks there, then that’s okay,” he said, not sure how to be a good friend and ask for what he needed at the same time. He already knew that those days were going to be all that carried him through until their first visit. “It’s your honeymoon, you should enjoy it.”

“I plan to,” Julia said, pointing her spoon at him. “And then we’re going to come home and spend three days eating pizza and kicking your ass at Mario Kart.”

That sounded like everything he needed. Now, always. And when it came down to it, he knew that they were going to have an incredible time away, but that didn’t mean that they would enjoy their time with him any less. “What would I do without you?” he said, and then stiffened when it occurred to him that he was going to have to figure that out.

Before he could start to spiral, Julia pulled his hand from his lap and threaded her fingers through his, squeezing his hand tightly. She smiled at him sadly, and he was grateful both for her comfort and for the fact that she wasn’t going to press the point. She saw him, and was there for him, and that was enough. He didn’t want to dwell on being apart from her, not tonight. Tonight was for her, and for James, and for celebrating.

The grin that overtook her face after a few seconds did a pretty great job of forcing the grasping fingers of loneliness away. “I guess you’ll just have to distract yourself with all of the pretty guys and gals you’ll be meeting in New York,” she said with a shrug, turning back to her cake.

Groaning loudly, both to play along and also because… well, talking about his romantic prospects was never _not _awkward, Quentin picked up his spoon with his other hand. “I’m going there to write, Jules. That’ll be distraction enough.”

“Speaking of,” she said, as though he hadn’t said anything, and he already knew to dread whatever she was going to say next. “You and Eliot were getting pretty chummy before.”

He saw straight through the casualness of her tone, her half-shrug. _Of course_ she’d pounced on this — he’d known it would have to come at some point. “We were just talking,” he said, his thoughts immediately full of the curve of Eliot’s smile, the amused glint in his eyes, the musical note of his laughter.

Taking her last bite of cake, Julia dropped her spoon down onto her place, pausing to swallow as she twisted in her seat to face him. “And dancing,” she pointed out.

Cake. He looked down at his plate, only to find it empty of dessert and distractions. “I danced with you, too, remember.”

“Hey!” Stiffening instinctively, Quentin looked up in the direction of the indignant protest, only to realise James was puffing up ridiculously on Julia’s other side, looking at their clasped hands. “Hands off _my wife_,” he said, only he was doing a terrible job of keeping the shit-eating grin off his face.

Raising his hands defensively, Quentin returned it, unable to help himself either. “You’re going to keep that up all night, aren’t you?”

Giving up trying to keep his face straight, James slung his arm along the back of Julia’s chair, sneaking a grin at her before he turned back to Quentin. “I just like saying it,” he said with a shrug.

Julia’s laughter resonated seamlessly with the swelling of affection Quentin felt for the two of them, and his grin softened into warmth. He still couldn’t believe, after so many years, that he had such good friends as these, who held him just as close despite finding something special in each other. Julia leaned over to kiss James, and his arm stayed around her when she turned back to face him. God, they looked so happy. If only the spark in Julia’s eye was _just_ from being newly happily married. “I’m just saying,” she continued, as though no one had interrupted her. “It’s not like he’s aging badly.”

He’d never considered the possibility that Eliot might not age well. It just wouldn’t happen. He couldn’t quite make the image form, of Eliot’s skin lined with wrinkles. Would he go white or grey? And besides, late twenties was hardly _aging_. The person he’d met tonight was a man in his prime. “That doesn’t mean I have to… or that I want to…” He couldn’t even say it, felt himself growing hot just from fumbling around the words.

Julia’s eyes were far too seeing. Not that it was difficult — she always saw straight through him. “Oh, really?” she said, her voice heavy with skepticism.

“I haven’t even… thought about that,” he said, determinedly _not_ letting his thoughts slip to the way Eliot had looked up at him through his eyelashes while on his knees in Camille’s closet, and oh god, he could feel his cheeks flushing hot. He _hadn’t _been thinking about it, not before now. But none of that mattered, he thought, clearing his throat. “It’s your wedding, Jules —”

“Which is exactly why you should get laid,” Julia said, and Quentin cringed when she didn’t bother to make an effort to lower her voice. “Isn’t that what singles do at weddings? I wouldn’t know, I’m a married woman now,” she added with an exaggerated air of sophistication, waving her hand in the air.

Quentin groaned obligingly, feeling buoyed by the flicker of a grin that he caught, but when she raised her eyebrows at him pointedly, he realised that she wasn’t going to let it go. “We were just catching up,” he insisted. “I hadn’t even thought about it. And neither has Eliot.” Of course he hadn’t, right? Eliot had been… perfectly friendly and charming and wonderful, in all of the ways that he’d remembered. But he hadn’t been flirting with him. He would have recognised _that._

Julia, apparently, wasn’t so convinced. “Hmm.” Turning to look at the room at large, she paused, a smug smile spreading across her face as she waves her fingers at someone. “So then why has he been watching you since we sat down for dessert?”

His breath held in his throat, Quentin followed her gaze across the room to Eliot's table. Eliot was looking right back at him, or maybe — no, he was looking at Julia, grinning at her widely. As she waved at him, he blew her a kiss with a flourish, and Julia snorted beside him. "I shouldn't be surprised that he's just as much of a show off as I remember," she said, but when he tore his eyes away from Eliot (was he looking at him now? He couldn't tell), she was smiling.

Quentin wasn't surprised at all. He _was_ still surprised by the combination of comfort and anxiety that was still rattling through him. When he didn't respond, Julia leaned in towards him slightly, her grin slipping. Sighing, he gave into the inevitable, a little frustrated because he _knew_ that talking it through would help, but still. The last thing he wanted to be doing tonight was dragging her into his drama. Particularly drama that he hadn't been expecting to have to deal with. "I haven’t been pining for him," he started, wanting to make that clear. Because he hadn't. He'd built a whole life in Eliot's absence, a life he was happy with. He’d dated people, he’d been in love.

“I know _that_,” Julia said.

Without bothering to protest — because she _would_ have known if he’d spent the last ten years holding a candle for his ex-boyfriend — Quentin shrugged half-heartedly. “It’s not like it’s all rushing back to me, or anything dramatic like that,” he said. “It’s just… it’s just really good to see him.” He dropped his eyes to the table in front of him, his hands twisting in the edge of the tablecloth. “He was a big part of our lives. Him and Margo. He was… as well as — you know, I was in love with him — but as well as that… the two of them were our best friends. It’s hard to think of those four kids growing up and not even speaking to each other.”

He didn’t look up when Julia’s hand covered his again, squeezing tightly. “You missed them.”

Huffing a laugh, he watched her thumb stroke over the back of his hand. “I didn’t even realise it. It’s not like I didn’t think about them, but I didn’t realise just how much I missed them. How happy we were…”

“Everyone gets nostalgic for high school, Q.”

“That’s not really what I mean,” he said, without heat.

She nodded. “I know.”

But she didn’t, not really. It was more than that, it was… He forced his eyes up to meet hers, forced himself to put words to the fear that he hadn’t quite been able to even let himself feel. “I don’t want you and me to be like that.”

She drew back a little, her lips parting in surprise. “In what universe do you think we’re not going to be talking every day? We’re not going to be like that.” Dropping his hand, she wrapped her arms around his shoulders. “I’m not going to let it happen. _You’re_ not going to let it happen.” Drawing back, she touched his cheek briefly before tilting her head slightly to the side. “And, nothing’s stopping you from fixing that with El and Margo, either,” she pointed out. “Even if it’s just as friends. Even if you want to bang him.”

Groaning, he covered his face, trying to hide the sudden flush of his cheeks, but she pulled his hands away, laughing. “You’re the worst.”

“I’m just saying. Don’t you dare even think about holding back on my account, Q. From whatever you want. I would disown you forever.”

* * *

The night had evolved toward dancing and shouted conversations above the loud music when Eliot and Margo strode up to the bridal table. Margo was tucked tightly into Eliot’s side, one arm wrapped around his waist while the other held out a shiny blue and silver striped gift bag. “We brought you something,” she said, placing the bag on the table in front of Julia.

Curious, Quentin leaned over to get a better look as Julia reached inside, lifting out a bottle of rum. “Oh, thank you,” she said. “There’s a table along the wall near the entrance for gifts.”

When he looked up at the two of them once more, Margo was smirking. Eliot’s arm tightened around her shoulders as he bent to press a kiss to the top of her head. Their affection was so easy, so obviously unconditional, and it felt great to see them like this. The light in Margo’s eyes sent a rush through him. “Where do you think we got it from?”

Laughing, Julia slipped the bottle back into the gift bag. “Are you implying I haven't drunk enough?”

“That’s exactly what we’re implying, darling,” Eliot said, holding out his hand to her across the table. “Now let’s get some fresh air, shall we?”

Julia glanced around the room with her lower lip caught between her teeth, but her face smoothed out as she made a decision. Quentin followed her gaze. She’d only just returned from dancing with Fen and Kady and some of her other friends, and the dance floor was still crowded, people laughing and dancing and enjoying each other. Others were scattered in conversation around various tables, a handful more congregated around the bar. There were no issues to diffuse, nothing to ‘handle’.

“Okay,” she said, beaming as she turned toward him, and he felt his heart skip a beat. More than anything, he wanted her to enjoy this night for herself, and for James, and not spend the whole night making sure everyone else was having a good time. He’d thought he’d have to actually fight her on that, but if all it took was a nudge in the right direction from Margo and Eliot… He turned back to them, watched as Julia put her hand in Eliot’s and let him pull her to her feet, saw the way she grinned at them.

He’d forgotten that _she_ might have missed them, too.

“I’ll retrieve your husband,” Eliot said, lifting Julia’s hand to kiss it before he let go. “Meet you outside.”

Winking at Julia, Eliot turned and strode over to where James was talking to Penny, Josh, and a few others to the side of the dance floor. Quentin met Margo around the other side of the table, surprised and then pleased when Margo slipped her arm through his. "Come on, Coldwicker and Co," she said, nodding toward the exit, and Quentin glanced over his shoulder to see Fen and Kady following as they weaved between the tables.

It wasn’t until the cool night air hit Quentin’s skin that he realised how warm he’d been inside, and he breathed in deeply, feeling it steady him. The music bled through the open doors into the night, reaching out to the grassed area where a few chairs had been left out beside a large, fancy stone bowl filled with sand and cigarette butts. Fairy lights were strung back and forth above their heads, casting everything in a faint glow. He was surprised to find the space empty, until he heard laughter and turned his head to see another smoking area near the side exit of the building.

It was through those doors that James appeared, closely followed by Eliot and Penny. He wasn't — he wasn't going to just stand there and watch them walk over, that would be ridiculous.

Julia and Eliot claimed the two chairs, with Margo perched on Eliot’s lap, and the rest of them stretched out on the ground. He’d surrendered his jacket for Fen to sit on, and he folded up the arms of his shirt before spreading his legs out in front of him and leaning back on his palms. He flexed his fingers in the cold grass, enjoying the way that the fresh air cleared his head a little.

Feeling something knock against his shoulder, he looked up to see Margo holding the bottle of rum out to him, and he took it happily, lifting it to his lips and taking a swig. The alcohol was a familiar burn in his throat and a welcome warmth in his chest, and he was smiling when he passed the bottle on to Kady.

“I can’t believe you invited Surendra,” Eliot scoffed, kicking his leg out in James's direction. "He was so pretentious that I don't know if he annoyed my group or yours more."

Pulling up a handful of grass, James threw it at Eliot, laughing when Margo brought her hands up to deflect it. "He's chilled out a bit since high school."

"Oh, is this from the time where you knew James and James's future wife at the same time and didn't realise until three days ago?" Penny said.

"Wait," James said. Drawing his legs underneath him, he pulled himself up onto his knees, pointing at Eliot while staring at Julia. "You were there."

Julia glanced between him and Eliot, who turned toward Quentin with raised eyebrows. Quentin shrugged, completely oblivious to whatever James was talking about. There for what? "I was there?" Julia prompted, apparently as lost as he was.

"Yes, you…" James was looking wildly between Eliot and Julia, and when he turned to include Quentin as well, he lifted his hands to say _I don't know what you're talking about._ "Okay, you weren't _there_, but you'd _know._"

He looked almost frantic. "How about you _tell us_ what we're supposed to know?" Quentin said, biting his lips together to stop himself from grinning.

James dropped his arm, settling his gaze on Eliot. "Drama camp," he said firmly. "Senior year."

He opened his mouth to ask James what exactly he was talking about, when he caught movement out of the corner of his eye and turned to see Eliot clinging to Margo, burying his face against her shoulder as his whole body shook with silent laughter. Margo wasn’t even trying to hide her grin.

It hit Quentin again just how random it was that these two people had known each other back then. He remembered Eliot going to drama camp — a week long program hosted by an acting school that was open to all of the schools in the surrounding areas. He knew that a lot of the kids who went were the same that Eliot went up against in his drama and debate club — he just had to keep kicking himself to remember that James was one of those kids.

Even after so many years, and the fact that he hadn’t actually gone himself, his memories of drama camp were crystal clear. He remembered sneaking peeks at his phone during class whenever he could, and the thrill of being missed. He remembered speaking to him on the phone until Eliot fell asleep, exhausted, talking about school and their friends and doing a pretty terrible job at phone sex. He remembered Eliot telling him about how much he loved the work and felt like he was learning a lot, how frustrating the other groups were and how everyone at a particular school had gotten a _mysterious_ sickness right before the last night where they were presenting the work that they’d done.

Sucking in his breath, Quentin stared at James, unable to believe it. “That was _you_?” Eliot had told him all about it, laughing so hard it had been difficult to understand him down the phone — how they’d been so fucking arrogant about how well they were going to perform, and one packet of diahrettics in their smoothies later, it hadn’t been a problem.

“See?” James said, gesturing toward Quentin and turning back to Eliot with wide eyes. “He knows what the fuck I’m talking about because you fucking did it, didn’t you? He’s been adamant every time I’ve tried to get it out of him in the last _ten years_,” he added to Quentin, “but you know something, don’t you?”

“Of course he knows something,” Eliot said, his voice strained. He wiped a finger underneath his eye, and Quentin couldn’t tell if it was because he was actually crying or if he was being dramatic. “Do you honestly think that I wouldn’t have told him when your whole team couldn’t get off the toilet long enough to do your performance?”

Julia was looking back and forth between them, absolutely delighted. “I can’t believe you were in the group that got stomach flu on camp.”

James’s affronted protests were almost drowned out by Eliot’s burst of laughter. Quentin couldn’t believe that she was playing along. “_Stomach flu?_ That all of us got and no one else did?”

“Maybe it was food poisoning?” Margo suggested dryly.

“Again, that only we got?” Groaning dramatically, James scooted over and knocked his shoulder into his, pushing him sideways. “You’re all assholes.”

“Takes one to know one.”

Between all of them, it didn’t take long for the bottle of rum to empty, and James was still muttering about certain people being dirty filthy liars when he went inside to hunt for more. Quentin waved at him cheerfully as he turned to look at them over his shoulder before he disappeared inside, hoping that he wasn’t going to take his revenge by not coming back out. The edge of sobriety that the cold night air had given him had faded away thanks to the rum, and he sat with his legs sprawled out on the grass, kicking idly at Julia’s chair as he listened to Kady and Penny telling blatant lies about James while he wasn’t there to defend himself. He could tell from the grins on Eliot and Margo’s faces that they didn’t believe a word, but James trying to sell weed to the dean’s daughter was a pretty great image, and who was he to poke holes in the story?

It wasn’t until he felt Julia’s foot against his side that he realised that she’d stood up, or that she was leaning down over him. “Dance with me, Q,” she said, grabbing his hand and tugging on it in a half-hearted attempt to get him to his feet.

He did _not_ want to dance anymore. He also kind of did, and felt the thrill of alcohol running through him just enough to know that he was going to make an absolute fool of himself if he did so. “The music’s inside,” he said, knowing that she could tear his excuse to pieces with the smartphone in his pocket.

The way her eyes lit up terrified him. She reached down for his other hand, making more of an effort to pull him up, and he reluctantly went with her, stumbling a little as she kept pulling once he was upright. “Q. Quentin. Do you remember that dance we made up?”

Oh no. Oh god no. “I’m not doing the dance we made up in tenth grade.”

“Show us the dance!” Margo called.

“Oh, we’re dancing?” James said, uncapping a bottle of scotch and taking a long draw before handing it to Penny.

“We’re not —”

“_Ayo, I’m tired of using technology_,” Julia sang, cupping her hands around her mouth, step, step, and _thrust_, and then stopped, looking at him pointedly.

Margo leaned forward, resting her chin in her palm, watching him intently. Behind her, Eliot was clearly struggling to keep a straight face.

Sighing in defeat, he walked over to Penny and took the scotch from him, taking a long, purposeful drink and ignoring the cheering and applause that came from most of the group. Passing the bottle back, he walked back over to stand beside Julia, not daring to look anyone in the eye.

If he was going to make an idiot out of himself, he might as well lean into it.

It took them three tries to get past the first few seconds before Julia paused to kick her shoes off. The fourth time, they made it right to the _uh, uh, she wants it,_ before their audience burst into laughter, and Quentin turned to see Eliot shaking his head at him in wonder, a grin stretched wide across his face. He couldn’t help but get caught up in it right along with them, feeling ridiculous right down to his core and loving every second of it.

Someone finally made the connection that smartphones plus internet equalled music, and Julia managed to bully most of them to stand up and dance with her. Quentin doubled over in laughter when James picked her up over his shoulder and started spinning her around. Put back on her feet, she stumbled in three different directions before Eliot caught her and twirled her under his arm, and she was laughing so hard she was struggling to breathe. It was _good_, she was so happy and James’s eyes were bright as he watched her, and Quentin couldn’t remember the last time he’d felt this light.

“Show us your moves, Coldwater,” Margo said with a smirk, so he grabbed her hand and pulled, pleased when she span into him. Suddenly caught up in the need to show off, and fully intending to be over the top, he adjusted his grip on her, leaned his weight on one leg and dipped her, grinning when her hands tightened around his arms in surprise.

Tossing her head back, she laughed, deep and throaty. When she lifted her head, she shifted her weight and the next thing he knew he was on the ground with Margo underneath him, her body shaking with laughter. Rolling off her, he gasped for breath, and by the time that he felt like he could stand, James had helped Margo up and was grabbing his hand to get him to his feet as well.

The world spun around him for a moment, and when everything rightened he found Julia standing in front of him, slipping under his arm. He pulled her close, watching as Margo strode over to join Eliot in cheering Fen on as she tried to recreate their dance. He couldn't tell if she was doing better or worse, but Eliot's enthusiasm looked genuine as he called out pointers. Margo snatched the scotch from Penny and Kady, who had sat back down on the grass by the chairs, and when she stepped up to Eliot and handed him the bottle, he looked around, stopping and smiling when — when his eyes landed on Quentin.

Smiling back, he tightened his arm around Julia's shoulders, pressing his cheek against her hair. He hadn't imagined, at the start of the night, that he would be feeling this calm, this relaxed, this good. But it was more than good. He felt like an old wound was being knitted back together, a hurt that he hadn't even realised existed, a part of him that he'd stopped thinking about long ago.

They'd parted ten years ago, amicably, had barely spoken to each other since until today, and it felt like no time had passed at all.

He and Julia would survive a year.

"We're going to be okay," he said into her hair, his chest swelling with his love for her, for James, for his future.

"No shit." She pulled back enough to look at him, the red flush to her cheeks noticeable even in the dim light. "Of course we'll be okay."

Leaning up on her tiptoes, she kissed his cheek before she pulled away and headed over to Kady, trying to badger her into getting up to dance with her. Laughing at her chances, Quentin moved toward the others, looking forward to watching someone look as foolish as he did, but his first step sent the world spinning again and he stopped short, blinking a few times to bring it back into focus.

That was… yep, that was a second bottle of alcohol, empty on the grass.

Maybe sitting down was a good idea.

Keeping his steps slow and measured because he was absolutely not drunk, Quentin walked a few paces away from their impromptu dance floor. He dropped to his knees, rolled over so he was sitting, and it was so easy to go the rest of the way and just lay down. The grass was cool against his neck, and he closed his eyes, sighing happily.

He opened them after a minute or so at the swish of fabric nearby. Eliot’s smile was small but sincere when he sank down onto the grass beside him, tucking his legs up underneath him and leaning on one hand. “Sitting over here with your friends?” he teased, and Quentin tore at the grass, throwing it at him, and — they should probably stop doing that. The warmth in Eliot’s laugh was worth it.

“I am. A bit drunk,” he said, rolling his eyes and trying to restrain his grin at the faux-shocked look Eliot gave him. “And... I don’t want to forget tonight.”

His face softening, Eliot stared at him for a few seconds before he lowered himself onto the ground, rolling over onto his back so he lay shoulder to shoulder with Quentin. “Me either,” he said softly.

Smiling, Quentin looked up at the sky. It was a cloudless night, and the stars were a beautiful background to the fairy lights that were strung across the open space. He let himself sink into the music playing nearby, the sound of his friends talking and laughing, Eliot’s quiet breathing beside him. He thought back to all of the years that stretched between them. There was so much that he didn’t know about him. So much that Eliot didn’t know. It only felt like one thing mattered, right now. “Have you been happy?” he asked the stars.

“Yeah.” Eliot almost sounded surprised. Surprised that he was happy, or surprised that he’d asked? He paused, not moving except for the slow, quiet inhale, exhale that Quentin caught in his peripheral vision. “You?”

“Yeah.” And he was. He had friends who loved him, an experience of a lifetime waiting for him in New York in two weeks. Life had been treating him well, and he’d been letting it. And… now that he’d managed to get out of his head about being apart from Julia and James and the rest of his friends, he was_ excited _about New York. He was itching to start working on his book, to actually have the time to focus on creating instead of being stretched between work and writing and not enough sleep.

“I missed you.”

The words were spoken so quietly that it took Quentin a moment to realise that they weren’t his imagination. His throat suddenly tight, he blinked up at the sky, resisting the urge to turn and look at him. It shouldn’t feel good to be missed, but of _course_ it did — it mattered, if he mattered.

Had he been filled with this same strange blend of anxiety and rightness all night? “I missed you too,” he said. Admitting it — admitting it _to Eliot_ — felt like a weight off of his chest. “It’s almost funny that I didn’t realise how much until tonight. I’ve barely thought about you in years —”

“In _years?”_

Snorting, Quentin threw his arm out to hit his chest lightly. “Okay, well I haven’t been _pining_ for years. Fond reminiscing, sure. Sorry to burst your bubble, or whatever.”

“It’s fine,” Eliot said with a dramatic sigh. Quentin realised that the back of his hand was still resting on Eliot’s chest, and drew it back, settling it on his stomach. “Just so you know, I haven’t been pining either. I’m perfectly well-adjusted, thank you very much.”

Quentin finally turned his head, and found Eliot already looking at him. “Uh huh,” he said skeptically.

Eliot caught his lower lip between his teeth, but it was only a moment before his grin stretched wide across his face. “Well, more than I was, anyway.”

He turned to look back up at the sky, and Quentin followed suit. He was joking, but Quentin could see the truth in it, in the way that Eliot carried himself now, in his quiet satisfaction about the life that he’d built for himself. He hadn’t spoken about anyone except Margo and James, and he wondered… “Have you been seeing anyone?” he asked, the words falling from his lips before he could consider them, and his breath caught in his throat, his cheeks heating with embarrassment. “Oh my god, you don’t have to answer that,” he said immediately.

“You honestly think I haven’t already asked James and Jules that?” Eliot sounded like he was smiling, not awkward or annoyed like Quentin had feared. That didn’t stop him from wishing he could sink into the ground. “Everyone wants all the hot goss on the ex, right? I’m not with anyone, no. Dated a few guys, nothing too serious. I was with Mike for almost a year. He was _very_ pretty, but he was a Republican.” His shudder was audible. “It was never going to last. But it’s fine — I love my life, I love what I do. No one ever felt like home quite the way… the way I wanted.”

Quentin stared at the sky, marvelling at just how much that sentiment resonated with him. “I almost got engaged,” he said. “I don’t know if you remember that text message you sent me, what… four years ago?”

“You mean that butt text? Something something Cincinnati?”

He remembered pacing around his living room, waiting for Alice to get out of the shower so they could head to dinner. She was too smart not to notice that something was up if he’d made a big deal out of the night, so he’d suggested they go out to the restaurant a few blocks away just to get out of the apartment for a while. His phone had buzzed right when he’d heard the shower turn off, and he… he felt it now, a little, just from thinking about it — the way his world had stopped, seeing _Eliot Waugh (1) New Message_ on his home screen. He’d stared at the jumble of letters, at the random coherent ‘Cincinnati’ in the midst, feeling like he’d been thrown back into high school.

“Well it made absolutely no sense,” Quentin said, grinning at Eliot as he pushed himself up onto his elbow, rolling onto his side. “But apparently getting random messages from your ex boyfriend on the night you’re planning to propose spooks a guy. I had a ring and everything.”

The ring had burned a hole in his pocket all night, but he hadn’t brought it out.

It wasn’t until he was lying awake in bed that night that he’d found the courage to respond, and that dissolved the moment he’d pressed send. He’d kept his message casual, a joke about how Cincinnati was at that time of year, but his heart had been in his throat as the little dots had appeared to indicate that Eliot was typing something.

The dots had disappeared before a message posted, and Quentin had tried not to think too hard about what Eliot had chosen not to say.

The next week, he’d told Alice that things weren’t working out. He’d loved her. He had, truly. And it wasn’t like he was still in love with Eliot, but he’d forgotten what it was like to be _in love_ the way he’d been with Eliot, and… and he hadn’t been able to let himself settle for anything less than that.

It meant nothing, when he’d looked up Eliot on Facebook a few days later. It had meant less, when he’d seen pictures posted that day, of a particularly attractive dark haired man in his lap at what looked like a party. He hadn’t been… expecting anything, or looking for anything to happen, of course not, but he hadn’t been prepared for how uncomfortable it had been to see Eliot with someone else.

Eliot was looking down at him now, a small, thoughtful smile on his face. “I don’t know if I should say sorry or not.”

Quentin shrugged, suddenly feeling very aware that he’d basically just told his ex that he’d held back from a relationship because of a text from him. It… it was more than that, but he knew that backtracking would only make it worse. And also — he didn’t care probably as much as he should have. “She wasn’t home,” he said, smiling faintly when he saw Eliot recognise his own words from before.

“Pity for her,” Eliot said.

Taking a deep breath, Quentin forced Alice from his mind. It had been awkward between them for a while, but he was glad to still call her his friend. Even happier that she wasn’t here tonight, as awful as he felt about it. She’d never really clicked with Julia the way he’d hoped she would, no matter how hard he’d tried to force it.

Not that a friendship with Julia was the be all and end all. He broke into a grin, remembering the woman that Julia had tried to set him up with recently, a friend of hers from work. Who, tellingly, _hadn’t been invited to the wedding._ He remained unconvinced that it wasn’t a stitch up. “I went on a handful of dates with a woman a few weeks ago who’s just as into fantasy as I am, but for her it’s dragons or bust.”

Eliot’s eyebrows lifted, before he wrestled his expression into something serious. There was no stopping the light in his eyes. “There’s not many dragons in Fillory.”

It shouldn't surprise him, that he still knew him so well, but warmth spread through his chest just the same. "I know.”

“Completely incompatible.”

“Obviously.”

Eliot's eyes crinkled at the corners and Quentin huffed out a laugh, unable to keep a straight face for more than a few seconds.

When he shifted his weight slightly, Eliot's knee knocked against his leg, and he wasn't sure whether it was by accident or by design but he was suddenly very aware of how close they were. Propped up on his elbow beside him, his free hand flat on the small amount of grass between them, there was something so incredibly soft in the way Eliot's eyes moved over his face, in the small smile playing around his lips. Without even thinking about it, he reached up to brush the tips of his fingers over his cheekbone, lost in the way Eliot's eyes fluttered shut as he turned his face slightly into the touch. When they opened again, he was caught in his gaze, his eyes dark but for the specks thrown by the fairy lights.

He didn't feel drunk. As he slipped his hand around to the back of Eliot's head, his fingers carding through his hair as he pushed himself up on his other elbow, he felt steadier than he'd ever felt in his life.

Eliot bent his head to meet him, his hand curling around the back of his neck as his lips pressed against his, warm and soft and so, so natural. He could feel Eliot’s smile, felt his hand squeeze gently, felt the low vibration of the sound he made in the back of his throat. Together, they sank back into the grass.

Breaking the kiss, Eliot stayed close, his nose pressing against his cheek, his thumb stroking along his jaw as he took in a long, deep breath, and then his mouth was on Quentin’s once more. He felt the press of Eliot’s body all along his and reached out blindly to grip at his waist, wanting him closer, leaning up into him. Eliot tilted his head to deepen the kiss and Quentin’s lips parted eagerly, wrapped up in the taste and the smell and the feel of him. _Closer_.

Eliot moved almost like he'd heard his thought, his hand sliding from his jaw down his neck, settling at his waist, his fingers like fire through the thin material of his shirt. Quentin turned into him, pressing his chest up against his, feeling it swell as Eliot sucked in a breath through his nose, his hand shifting on the back of his head to thread his fingers through his hair, and Quentin —

— yelped as something hit his leg, and his hands tightened on Eliot's shoulders as he pulled away in time to see Fen falling over them and toppling onto the grass. Julia was in a heap on the ground beside her, her arm caught in Fen's hand, and the two of them were laughing so hard they were gasping with it. "Are… are you okay?" he asked, sitting up as Eliot leaned back. His concern muted his embarrassment even as he felt his cheeks start to flush, thinking about what they'd stumbled over — literally — and the fact that Eliot had turned to sit beside him, but he was… not letting him go.

To be fair, he wasn't letting go, either.

His question only made them laugh harder, and he turned to Eliot, grinning at him bashfully. Eliot was already looking at him, his eyes warm and bright as he dropped his hand from his neck to rest over Quentin's as it supported him on the grass, his other reaching up to pull something from his hair.

Quentin glanced at it, but the strand of grass between his fingers didn't interest him nearly as much as the soft upturn of Eliot's lips. His smile widened, and Quentin forced his eyes up to meet Eliot's, crinkled in amusement, and knew he'd been caught. He didn't care. He really wanted to kiss him again. "El —"

"Q! Quentin, Quentin." Reluctantly, he tore his eyes away to see Julia getting awkwardly to her feet nearby. "Quentin, you have to come do photos with me! Did you see the pirate hats? We have to be pirates on my wedding day. Q. Pirates."

Her eyes were wide with excitement. He couldn't tell her no. "Looks like the bride needs your services," Eliot said.

There wasn't any frustration in his voice, only amusement and fondness. If he left now, was the moment over? Eliot's thumb worked circles over the back of his hand. "Can't say no to the bride."

"Most certainly not."

Quentin still didn't move. His smile widening slightly, Eliot tilted his head in Julia's direction, and — _yeah, okay._ Untwining his hand from Eliot's, he climbed to his feet, then turned back to him after a pause. "Coming?"

He saw the joke pass over Eliot's face, but he settled on a smirk. "I think I have to save Penny," he said, glancing past Quentin.

He looked over his shoulder to see Margo and Penny sitting on the grass together, their gestures getting broader with whatever supposedly good natured argument they were having. "Your funeral." Turning back to Eliot, he took a breath in, ready to say… something? He didn’t know what. Maybe ‘did that mean anything’ or ‘do you want it to’ or ‘what is wrong with me that I didn’t think about how good you kiss every day for the last ten years’. But the words got caught in his throat, and then Julia’s hand was on his arm, pulling him back toward the hall. His resolve failed him just before they reached the door, and he caught a quick glimpse of Eliot lowering himself onto the grass beside Margo before he disappeared out of sight.

* * *

Leaning back in his chair, Quentin nursed the glass of wine in his lap, tipping it back and forth idly as he watched the room. He’d found a seat at one of the tables off to the side. The name cards had been disrupted in the night but no one was sitting here, and he didn't want the attention of sitting up at the bridal table right now.

No, he just wanted to sit here and dwell.

Or maybe not dwell. Dwell made it sound like he was sad, and he wasn't sad, he was just... thoughtful.

Thoughtfully watching his ex-boyfriend, who he'd just kissed, talking to one of his best friends right across the room.

Eliot was grinning at James, who stood with one hand on Eliot's shoulder and the other gesturing as he talked. He looked happy, like he didn't have a care in the world, like he hadn't just made out with _his_ ex-boyfriend an hour ago, or at least like he wasn't freaking out about it.

Not that Quentin was freaking out about it. Did he want Eliot to be freaking out about it?

Looking across the room, he watched the way Eliot's face lit up as he laughed, and couldn't want any different.

It wasn't _a thing_. Eliot was obviously happy in Los Angeles, and even if he wasn't, Quentin was two weeks out from moving to New York. Spending time with him tonight felt like slipping right back into place, but he knew that they were both different people, ten years of life experience apart from the kids they'd been in high school.

It was just a moment shared between two men having fun, who were maybe a little drunk, who had both been reminded of a good time in their lives.

It had felt _really_ good to kiss him, though.

He glanced up when he saw someone approaching, lifted his glass in acknowledgement when he saw it was Margo. Pulling the chair out beside him, she crossed her legs, leaning over to rest her head on his shoulder. He reached for her hand automatically, then wondered if that was weird.

She curled her fingers around his, so he didn't pull his hand away. He felt as much as heard her heavy sigh. "I missed the pining looks you two sent each other, even when you were together. It was sickening."

His huff of laughter disrupted her on his shoulder, and she retaliated by elbowing him in the side before settling against him once more. "I'm not pining," he told her.

"Uh huh," she said, and he rolled his eyes at her unconvinced tone.

He wasn't pining, but he continued to watch Eliot with James. "I still can't believe that they know each other," he said softly.

"You should have seen the look on Eliot's face when he saw Julia at the airport. I don't think I've seen him that thrown in years."

Rubbing his thumb over Margo's, he hesitated on his next words, knowing she already thought he was all up in his feelings. "Can I ask you something?"

Sighing, she pushed up from his shoulder, turning to look at him askance. "Do you really think I came all the way over here to listen to you talk about your butterflies?"

Fair. It was Margo, afterall. He bit back the teasing retort, knowing he'd only get worse back. He knew she'd hear him out anyway, even if it only led to her telling him to get his shit together. "I asked him, but — well, you know. I wanted to be sure. If he's happy? That he's been happy."

"Yeah, he's happy," she said, surprising him with an honest answer. She looked at him for a few seconds before her face softened, and she turned back to watch Eliot and James.

Julia and Fen had joined them, the four of them the only ones hanging around the bar. The guests had started noticeably thinning about half an hour ago, and he had a feeling that they'd be clearing out themselves soon. The bridal party all had rooms booked at a hotel nearby, and maybe he should start thinking about organising an Uber for them. He wondered where Eliot and Margo were staying. Her parents place, maybe?

"It wasn't always great," Margo said suddenly. It took him a moment to realise what she was talking about, and when it did, he twisted in his seat to look at her squarely. She pressed her lips together in a grimace. "He said he told you about Henry. That was really hard on him. Failing at the thing he'd left you for was hard on him. Leaving you in the first place — I had to forcibly drag him out of bed more times than I care to remember, in the first week alone." She tilted her head. "But he's kicking life's ass at the moment, and yes, he's happy."

Quentin chewed on his lower lip, still stuck on her earlier words. "I didn't think… that leaving would have been so hard on him," he said carefully, not quite able to voice the implication that he'd been the thing that was so hard to leave behind.

Margo stared at him for a few seconds more before she started shaking her head at him, throwing up a hand in exasperation. "If you think that, you're a goddamn idiot, Coldwater."

"If it was so hard, then why didn't he want to try and make it work?" he said, the words blurting out before he could catch them. But they were out now, and he couldn't call them back. "If it mattered so much, why didn't he fight harder for it?" _For me?_

"I don't know," Margo said evenly, her gaze unwavering on his. "Why didn't you?"

It took him a moment to realise that he was staring at her with him mouth open like a fucking goldfish. He snapped it shut, straightening his shoulders, trying to get his feel back under him. Those simple words, _why didn't you_, knocked him back down every time. "I didn't want to hold him back," he said, pushing the words past the sudden lump in his throat. He hadn't told Eliot that, hadn't wanted him to feel guilty about chasing his dream. "I didn't want him to be worried about me."

Reaching between them, Margo cupped his cheek gently for a few seconds before tapping it sharply enough to make him jump. "Oh, Quentin. Why do I choose to surround myself with morons?" She shot down his protest with a glare, eased up and drew her hand back when he let it slide. "Quentin, he was too scared to ask you to try," she said, matter of factly. "He was too scared that you'd realise that he was a mess the second he was out of sight. He thought that he didn't deserve you, that you were better off keeping your options open because you deserved someone better than him or some bullshit like that."

"Oh," he said, turning to look at Eliot again. He could only just make out the small smile on his face as he watched Julia talk. He couldn't wrap his head around the thought that _Eliot_ might have been worried about _him._ It was easy for twenty eight year old Quentin to forget that Eliot had been just as much of a scared kid at eighteen as he was. "Well… shit. But… okay, but — didn't I deserve to decide that? For myself?"

"Absolutely you did," Margo said dryly, raising her eyebrows as him when he glanced at her again. "Just as he deserved to decide whether you were holding him back or not."

Grimacing at her, he squeezed her hand, grateful that she was still holding it. "We were a bunch of idiots back then, weren't we?"

"Were?" She grinned at him for a few seconds before rolling her eyes. "Look. You haven't been pining, he hasn't been pining, no one's making themselves sick over a life unlived or whatever sappy bullshit. Just don't fall out of touch again, okay? It's meant a lot to him to spend time with you tonight."

He smiled at her cautiously. "It's meant a lot to him, has it?"

Her eyes narrowed into a glare. "That's what I said." Sniffing dismissively, she lifted her chin, untwining her fingers from his to hold out her hand. "Give me your phone."

"What? What for?"

He passed it over anyway, looking over her shoulder as she opened the Facebook app and sent a friend request both to herself and to Eliot. His grin broke out of its own accord when she handed it back. "Aw Margo, I missed you too."

His phone buzzed in his hand, and he glanced down to see a Messenger notification on his screen. Eliot’s face stared up at him, and he clicked open the message. _Get your pretty asses over here._ “We’ve been summoned,” he told her, showing her the message.

Tutting, she rose to her feet. “I guess your ass is okay,” she said with a wink.

The group around the bar had grown to include Penny and Kady, and Julia and James stepped away as he and Margo approached. "They're doing the rounds to say goodbye," Fen told them. "We're heading back to the hotel."

"The bar's closing and Penny has a couple bottles of whiskey waiting for us in the hotel room," Kady added.

Quentin resisted the urge to look at Eliot and Margo. He was still hyped up on good feeling and alcohol, and he didn’t want the night to end just yet, wasn’t sure that he knew how to say so. He could have kissed Penny when he turned to them. “You two coming?”

“And say no to the free booze?” Eliot said. “Of course we’re coming.”

“Eliot, honey,” Margo said, slipping underneath his arm and patting his chest affectionately, “you own a chain of bars, remember?”

“And your point is?”

Fifteen minutes later they were piling into a pair of Ubers out the front of the venue. Readjusting the bundle of Julia’s skirts across his lap, he turned to her to find her smiling at him. “You had a good night?” he asked her.

Sighing pleasantly, she leaned back against James’s shoulder. “I really, really did,” she said. James’s eyes were warm as he leaned down to press his lips against her hair. “Although…” She paused, grimacing at him apologetically. “I think we’re going to skip the after party, because I really want to go have sex with my husband.”

Fen choked on her laughter in the front seat.

The hotel was only a ten minute drive away, and Quentin was helping Julia out of the car when he glanced up, squinting against the glare of the headlights from the other car. Eliot and Margo were grinning at him as they climbed out of the backseat. "Guess where we're staying?" Margo asked, while Eliot gestured grandly to the building in front of them.

"I thought you'd be staying with your parents or something," he said to Margo, who looked at him like he was insane.

"Why would I do a dumb thing like that?"

They all crowded into the elevator, saying goodbye to Julia and James with cheers and wolf-whistles as the doors closed, and was he really surprised that they’d booked a room on a different floor than the rest of them? It wasn’t until they were in the quiet hallway that he remembered that yep, there were other people here and most of them were probably asleep at one o’clock in the morning.

Kady and Penny’s room was a few doors down from his, and perfectly identical. Shrugging out of his jacket, he tossed it over the arm of the singular chair in the room and then followed Margo to the bed, claiming a spot beside her with his back against the headboard. “Can you at least take your shoes off?” Kady complained, and he grinned at her sheepishly as he started unlacing them.

“Oh, getting intimate now, are we?” Eliot said. Removing his shoes, he set them aside and then crawled onto the bed, stretching out so that his feet were tucked neatly between Quentin’s thigh and Margo’s. Margo lifted up, grabbed the pillow out from under her and tossed it toward him. “Aw, thanks darling,” he said, his hand to his heart in an exaggerated gesture of appreciation as he used the other to double the pillow over and tuck it behind his shoulders and prop himself up. That that was just… not fair, the way tucking his arms behind him head stretched his body out like that, long and lean and so nice to wrap around and —

— and he was staring. He glanced up at Eliot's face, heat rising in his cheeks when he realised he'd been caught. Eliot looked right back at him, his eyebrow lifting, his mouth twisting like he was trying not to smile.

_Of course_ he enjoyed being looked at. And, Quentin realised with a quiet laugh, probably knew exactly what he was doing as he stretched out like that.

He was still trying to decide whether he wanted to call him out on it when he felt a hand in his hair. He tried to turn toward Margo, but her grip was firm as she wrestled him the other way until his back was to her. _So much for the prime position against the headboard._ She tugged at the hair tie holding his hair back until it fell free to his shoulders, and then started to thread her fingers through it. “Let me braid it.”

“Hmm, no thanks.”

He felt a sharp tug, and let out a breathless laugh. He could hear the wicked smile in Margo’s voice when she spoke. “Trust me, it’ll be as good for you as it is for me.”

Eliot looked amused and entirely unhelpful as he watched them. Her hands in his hair did feel nice, but that didn’t mean he wanted everyone’s attention on him while she fussed over him. “Margo, I’m not drunk enough to let you braid my hair.”

“Penny!” she called immediately, one hand leaving his head and he turned it to see her twisted away from him. “Help a girl out, would you?”

A bottle was pressed into his hand, and he took a mouthful gladly before passing it on. “Thanks,” he said cheerfully. “Still not braiding my hair.”

Sighing heavily, Margo pulled him back to lean against the headboard. “Fine. Spoilsport.”

His belt dug uncomfortably into his middle, and he did his best to adjust it without drawing attention to himself. “Maybe next time?” he offered, not meaning it for a second.

“So you’ll be all done up the next time I see you, good to know,” Eliot said, his eyes twinkling, and Quentin felt the thrill of _next time_ run through him.

It ran like heat over his skin, up his chest, and he pulled at the collar of his shirt, suddenly warm. His tie was stuffed already into one of his jacket pockets, and he thumbed open another button of his shirt. He wished for something more comfortable to wear, and then straightened when he remembered the t-shirt and sweatpants that he’d packed to wear home tomorrow. “I’ll be back in a minute,” he said to the questioning faces looking up at him. “I’m getting out of this suit.”

“Ooh,” Margo said, leaning forward and resting her elbows on her knees.

“And coming back in something comfortable,” he added, picking up his shoes and resisting the urge to throw one at her.

Grabbing his jacket as well, he slipped out of the room and walked the handful of steps to his own. His keycard was in his wallet, and he balanced his belongings in one arm as he pulled the card out and held it up to the electronic lock.

Flicking the light on with his elbow, Quentin walked over to the small table in the corner of the room and dropped his shoes and jacket on top of it, labelling that tomorrow’s problem. His overnight bag was on the floor beside the bed, and he lifted it up onto the mattress, pulling out his change of clothes. He removed his shirt, slacks, socks, and was just stepping into his sweatpants when a knock sounded at his door.

Pulling them up over his hips, he walked over to the door and turned the handle.

Eliot stood on the other side. His arms hung loose by his sides, but his hands twitched as though he fought the urge to squeeze them. His shoulders looked tense, the smile around his lips uncertain. But his eyes… there was something so incredibly soft about his eyes.

Quentin was staring. But that was okay — Eliot was staring too, and he realised too late that he’d answered the door shirtless. His instinct was to curl in on himself, to cover himself up, but he didn’t want to, not with Eliot looking at him like _that_. Eliot, who had followed him to his room. Quentin licked his lips. “Hey,” he said, feeling breathless.

He watched Eliot’s throat move as he swallowed. “Hi.”

The corner of the door bit into his hand, and he gripped it tighter. He was hot all over, his skin itching with the urge to reach for him. But maybe he was here for… not that, he shouldn’t assume, he should… invite him in? Yeah, okay. “Do you want —”

Eliot moved, and Quentin barely managed to suck in a gasp before Eliot’s mouth covered his, his lips as soft and gentle as his hands on his face. Quentin reached up instinctively to grab his shoulders, desperate for him not to let go as he returned the kiss, and the thrill of it sent a shiver down his spine. The brush of Eliot’s tongue on his lower lip as he deepened the kiss rushed through him, as did Eliot’s hand on his lower back, pulling him tight against him. The buttons of his vest scratched against Quentin’s chest, but he barely felt it compared to Eliot’s warm touch on his skin.

They were still standing in the doorway. Quentin was breathing hard as he dropped down onto his heels, letting his forehead fall against Eliot’s neck. “Do you want to come in?” he murmured, suddenly feeling too nervous to look up at him as he asked.

Eliot’s low hum as he pressed his lips to his temple reminded him that Eliot was the one who had come to him. Tightening his arms around Quentin, he ducked his head to kiss his way down his cheek, and Quentin’s body arched forward into his as he angled his head back to kiss his neck. “Do you want me to?”

_Did he…?_ Taking a step back and pulling Eliot with him, he reached out blindly, swinging the door shut with probably a little too much force, grinning in embarrassment before he surged up to kiss him once more.

It wasn’t like he’d been thinking about it all night, he hadn’t, but now getting close to Eliot was the only thing on his mind. Quentin tore at the buttons of Eliot’s vest as they stumbled toward the bed. The back of his knees hit the edge of the mattress, and his hands tightened in soft material, pulling Eliot down with him as he pushed him backward. Eliot landed on top of him, his hips flush and one leg in between his, and Quentin’s hands grasped at his waist, his fingers digging in tight.

Manoeuvring higher on the bed, Eliot pressed him down into the mattress, his mouth finding his again before he could whine for the loss of it. He tasted whiskey on his tongue and kissed him deeper, swallowing the noise he made when he rolled up against him. The sound turned into a throaty laugh when Quentin nosed Eliot’s head to the side to kiss his neck. “Oh, that is… not _fair,_” Eliot huffed, and Quentin grinned against his skin, sucking at it harder just to hear him moan again and then soothing the spot with his tongue.

Eliot turned his head toward his, kissing him firmly before sitting back on Quentin’s lap. He leaned up automatically, reaching to pull him down with him again, but Eliot’s hands on his chest stopped him, pushing him back down onto the mattress. Quentin’s breath caught at the sight of him, straddling his thighs, his eyes dark as he looked down at him, and he felt every point of his fingers on his skin, felt the lack of them when he removed his hands. “Nice to see you haven’t learned any patience,” he teased, his voice thick.

Shrugging his vest off his shoulders, he started working at the top button of his shirt. Quentin stared hungrily at every inch of smooth skin as it was bared, felt something in him shift at the dusting of hair on his chest. They weren’t boys anymore. “Could you take this off any slower,” he said, leaning into the joke but also meaning it wholeheartedly. Pulling Eliot’s shirt out of his pants, he slipped the lowest button from its hole, then another, before giving up and pushing it up to spread his hands across his stomach. He felt the way his muscles twitched under his fingers, looked up to see Eliot’s lip caught between his teeth as he watched him. His hands slid around to grip his waist, his skin so warm underneath his palms. “I want —”

He wanted too many things, but Eliot seemed to catch onto the one at the forefront of his mind, his fingers working quickly on the last of his buttons and then tearing his shirt off his shoulders, tossing it — somewhere. Quentin’s whole attention was on Eliot as he leaned up, one arm wrapping around his waist while the other dove into his hair, pulling him down and kissing him with all of the longing-nervousness-confusion-joy that had been building inside of him all night.

Eliot held him just as tightly, dropping back onto the bed and grinding down on him in one smooth motion, stealing Quentin’s breath as he felt him hard against him. He couldn’t wait to get his hands on him, wanted to hear him fall apart with his mouth on him, wanted to feel him hot inside him. “Eliot,” he said, reaching down to fumble at his belt buckle.

The belt discarded on the floor, Quentin reached for the button of Eliot’s slacks but found his wrists caught. “Wait,” Eliot said, pressing his hands into the mattress by his side. Lifting his head back, he nudged at Quentin’s chin until he lifted his head back, and Quentin’s eyes fell closed at the feeling of his lips on his throat. Quentin fought his hands free to grip onto Eliot’s shoulders as he moved down his chest, squeezing when he flicked his tongue over his nipple. “I’ve been thinking about this all night,” he said.

Quentin squirmed as he sucked a mark just below the jut of his hip. His question of exactly what he’d been thinking about died on his lips when Eliot palmed him through his sweatpants, sending a jolt of pleasure through him. Eliot glanced up at him, his eyes alight as he hooked his fingers around the band of his pants and pulled them down, carefully freeing his straining cock.

He held his breath as Eliot’s hand circled him, his touch light as he stroked him from base to tip and back again, his eyes on him all the while. Every stroke felt like a shiver all over underneath his skin, and Quentin stared at him, feeling more than a little incredulous that — _fuck_ — Eliot was here, in his bed, jerking him off nice and slow and steady. Eventually his neck started to protest, but he couldn't look away, not when… fuck, when Eliot _licked his lips_, teasing his fingers over the head. "Please,” he breathed, jerking up into his hand, his eyes desperate on the way his tongue teased at his lower lip.

Eliot’s hand tightened around him, stilling around the shaft. “Oh, Q,” he murmured, and wrapped his lips around the head of his cock.

He couldn’t be ashamed of the broken sound that came from his throat, couldn’t think about anything other than the way Eliot’s mouth felt around him. Groaning, he squeezed his eyes shut, letting his head fall back onto the pillow as Eliot started to stroke his length again, gasping as his tongue teased over the tip again and again.

It was so much, it was quickly becoming _too _much, the incessant attention right where he was most sensitive winding him up tight until it was overwhelming. His hands came up to cover his face, reached higher to pull at his hair. Finally, Eliot took pity on him, sinking down to take him in deep and taking Quentin's breath with it. And — oh, the relief barely lasted longer than a moment before he was lost in the wet heat of Eliot's mouth all around him, in the way his tongue moved on the underside of his cock, in the way he sucked firmly as he drew back to the head.

Quentin’s hips angled up, chasing his mouth and Eliot’s moan as he thrust back in sent sparks rushing through him. He pressed back into the mattress, worry spiking in him that he might be too rough, but then one of Eliot’s hands grabbed at his, pulling it down to his head and — _oh shit_, he thought, sinking both hands into his curls, flexing his fingers against his scalp and fucking up into his mouth. Eliot moaned again, and Quentin felt it all around him, the sound vibrating around his cock and down through his whole body. “Oh my god,” he groaned, as Eliot’s hand dropped down to cup his balls, massaging them lightly, losing all his breath as he reached lower to press his fingers behind them. He moved down against the touch, then up into Eliot’s mouth, thrusting harder than he’d meant to and crying out when he hit the back of Eliot’s throat. Eliot’s fingers tightened around the base of him but didn’t pull back, he — fuck, he heard him take a deep breath in through his nose before he pushed his head down.

Quentin’s whole body started trembling at the feeling of Eliot’s throat squeezing around him. His hands twisted in his hair in a way that could only be painful, but Eliot wasn’t pulling back, wasn’t — even when he tugged at his hair, feeling the tension building up too high inside him and desperate for it not to end yet. “Eliot,” he gasped, and whimpered when Eliot made another deep, longing sound. _No, not — not yet, not —_ “Please, I’m gonna come, please —”

With obvious reluctance, Eliot lifted his head, looking down at Quentin’s cock for a moment before raising his eyes to meet his. “That’s the point,” he said, the corner of his mouth lifting into a smirk. His lips were so red, and Quentin couldn’t look away from them. He… he needed a beat, needed to calm down, didn’t want all of this to be over just yet. His whole body tensed when Eliot stroked him. “I want you to come now. And I want you to come while I’m fucking you.”

“Oh,” he said, and then “_oh,_” when he bent his head to take him in his mouth once more. He kept his lips wrapped around the head, teasing him with his tongue while his hand started stroking him faster, his grip on him firmer, and it was only seconds before his whole body was trembling with it. Letting his head fall back, he sucked in a gasp, trying to keep his hips from bucking as Eliot worked him closer and closer to the edge. “Eliot,” he whined in warning, his fingers twisting in Eliot’s hair again, and his answering groan was what tipped him over, his whole body stretching and shuddering as heat flooded through him again and again. Eliot’s mouth stilled over him but he didn’t pull back, stroking him through it until he collapsed back onto the bed, and Eliot finally let him slip from his mouth with a sinful hum of satisfaction.

“Oh, fuck,” Quentin said weakly, his hand remaining clutched in Eliot’s hair as he crawled up his body. A hand wrapped around the back of his neck, and Quentin arched up immediately, parting his lips to kiss him. He could taste himself on his tongue, and kissed him harder.

Eliot’s body lined up all along his felt too good, and Quentin groaned in protest when he rolled off him with a quiet laugh. Grinning at the ceiling, Quentin turned to watch Eliot as he settled against his side, just like they were lying outside on the grass earlier… except they were both shirtless, and Quentin’s sweatpants were tangled around his knees. Kicking them off, he turned in toward Eliot, smoothing his hand up his chest, grabbing the side of his neck to pull him down for another kiss. He felt boneless and giddy, and knew he’d never get tired of kissing him, couldn’t believe he’d wasted this whole night not kissing him.

Eliot’s hand burned against his waist, his fingers tightening every few seconds, and Quentin… Quentin wanted to see him anything close to as worked up as he’d been. He thought about the noises he’d made just from having Quentin’s cock in his throat, wanted to wring those sounds and more from him until neither of them could think straight.

Breaking the kiss, he worked his way along Eliot’s jaw instead, pressing his lips to the side of his neck as he dropped his hand between them, pulling at the button of his pants. Lowering the zipper, he reached inside to palm him through his underwear, his mouth stuttering against Eliot’s neck when he realised that his memory of how big he was wasn’t a nostalgic exaggeration.

Fingers circled his wrist, and he leaned back to look at Eliot questioningly when he pulled his hand away. Did he… had he changed his mind? But Eliot’s eyes were soft when he brought his hand to his lips, pressing them against his knuckles before he returned his hand to his neck. “We can take a minute," he said, brushing Quentin's hair back from his face, trailing his fingertips down over his cheek.

Quentin leaned into the touch. He’d never thought he’d end up here tonight, with Eliot in his bed, touching him so tenderly. Even twenty minutes ago, sitting in Kady and Penny’s room, he’d… okay, he’d hoped, he wasn’t going to deny that even to himself, but he couldn’t wrap his head around just how natural it felt to be lying here with him after all this time.

Despite what he’d been telling himself, in hindsight it felt like this had been building between them all night. He wondered whether Eliot had followed him to his room with this intention, or whether it had just happened. Had he been painfully obvious about it when he’d left? Quentin realised he didn’t care. “Are you sure Margo’s not going to miss you?” he asked, turning his head and pressing his lips against Eliot’s palm. He knew he wasn’t going to be the only one getting hounded for details tomorrow.

Laughing quietly, Eliot settled more comfortably against the pillow, catching his hand and holding it loosely between them. “Margo left thirty seconds after you did, dragging Fen along with her. Guess whose room they decided to use?”

“Oh, so that’s why you’re here?” Quentin grinned at him when he nudged him with his elbow. “Needed a bed to sleep in?”

Eliot’s mouth twisted like he was fighting a smile. “Yes, that is the only reason.”

“Thought so.”

After a moment Eliot’s brow pinched, his smile fading. His fingers loosened for a moment before squeezing around his. “You know I…” He trailed off, his eyes darting away, and Quentin reached up with his other hand to turn his face back to his.

“I’m joking,” he said softly, surprised and a little touched that Eliot was worried about him.

Taking a deep breath, Eliot relaxed his shoulders. His thumb stroked back and forth slowly over his palm. “Did I hope that this would happen? Yes, yes absolutely,” he said, the corner of his lip curling up, and Quentin laughed quietly, relieved to see that tension gone so easily. Eliot’s expression softened. “But I would have been just as happy to hang out and watch whatever’s on TV at 1am.”

“Just as happy?” he said, sliding his hand down Eliot’s side to settle on his waist.

Eliot shifted on the bed beside him. Quentin grinned up at him, pleased to get a reaction. “Well. Happy,” he said, his voice dropping low.

He suppressed a shiver, squeezing at Eliot’s side instead. “For the record, Golden Girls is usually on at this time if you wanna —”

His words were cut off in laughter, quickly muffled by Eliot’s mouth on his. Eliot kissed him firmly in a way that was clearly designed to shut him up, and he pinched at his side in retaliation. When he pulled back, Eliot dropped his head to his shoulder. “Remember when we used to stay up late and watch infomercials?”

Slowly, Quentin slid his arm further around him, rubbing his hand slowly up his back. When Eliot had said ‘let’s wait a minute,’ he’d thought his urgency higher than this, but… but his heart was full with this little moment, this tiny slither of time that they had together, and the soft expression on his face was worth every moment. “Hey, they had some good stuff on there sometimes,” Quentin said, ducking his head to kiss a line along his collarbone. Eliot’s hand in his hair felt nice. “Did you _see_ how much water the ShamWow could soak up?”

“Mmm, super impressive,” Eliot said against the side of his head. “Fell asleep at lunch more than once, but hey, at least you could recite the ad by rote.”

Quentin paused, turning his head to rest against Eliot’s shoulder. Those nights were some of his favourite memories. It didn’t matter what they were doing, just that Eliot’s arms were warm around him, his laughter loud and true, and that Eliot had wanted him there. _Much like now_, he thought. “I don’t know how to tell you this,” he said, hiding a smile, “but it wasn’t the infomercials I was staying up late for.”

Eliot’s chest moved underneath him in a deep gasp. “_No,_” he said, pulling back and staring at him with a shocked expression that lasted about three seconds before breaking out into a grin.

Rolling his eyes, Quentin reached forward to push his shoulder, then paused as something passed over Eliot’s face, his brows dropping and turning his smile sad. Quentin’s hand grasped at his shoulder instead, an offer of comfort as he waited, hoping that he’d share. The Eliot of the past had always danced around his feelings with everyone else, but during their relationship he’d gotten better at opening up to Quentin. _Tell me_, he said to him with the brush of his hand up to his neck, curling around the back until the tips of his fingers brushed his hair.

Slowly, Eliot brought his hand up to push Quentin’s hair back again. He wished for his hair tie, lost in Kady and Penny's room, except he liked the feeling of Eliot’s fingers on his skin. “So much has changed since then,” Eliot said quietly, not quite meeting his eye. “For me, and for you. I don’t really know who you are anymore.”

Stroking his thumb across his skin, Quentin swallowed down the sudden lump in his throat, blinked back the sudden sting in his eyes. “I think… I think you still know me better than almost anyone,” he said, his voice soft and raw and _oh_, this was too much, too much for one night together, too much for ten years apart, too much for LA and New York and Eliot’s flight tomorrow morning.

Eliot’s eyes were closed, squeezed tightly shut, and Quentin reached up to smooth out his brow with his thumb. He cupped Eliot’s cheek as he leaned into his touch, met his smile when he opened his eyes. Turning his head, Eliot pressed his lips to his palm, his smile almost an apology. “I have to be gone early in the morning. Our flight leaves at eight, because Margo is trying to destroy me one early morning at a time.” The fingers of his other hand flexed through the one still caught between them. “I’ll probably be gone by the time you wake up.”

A part of him wanted to point out that he hadn’t asked him to stay, but the joke died on his tongue. He wanted him to stay, of course he did. He wished he didn’t have to go in the morning, but he held that thought tight to his chest. Nostalgia was a heady thing, and he was more than willing to fall into it now, but that didn’t change anything for tomorrow, or the day after, or the day after that. It didn’t change the fact that they were two people with their own lives, who had already made the choice before to live them separately. Just because he might have done things differently, didn’t mean that he had any right to change it now, not when they were both working so hard on the things that mattered to them. “Wake me up before you go?” he said instead, hating how small he sounded.

“Okay,” Eliot said, leaning forward to press his forehead against his. “Yeah, okay.”

It was nothing at all to close the distance between them, to press his mouth against Eliot’s in a kiss that was too soft, too sweet, too full of all of the things that he needed to — to just stop feeling. Clutching at the back of Eliot’s head, he pulled him in close, shifting forward on the bed so he could press his body flush against Eliot’s.

Eliot’s arms came around him, and it felt so good to have him close like this, his skin pressed against his. Eliot’s hand on the back of his neck tilted his head, guiding Quentin’s lips apart and he went willingly, letting him deepen the kiss, clawing at the fire that sparked so easily in him once more because it felt easier, safer than the tugging at his heart. Pulling his other hand from Eliot’s, he slipped it low between them, straight inside Eliot’s underwear and wrapping it around his cock, now only half-hard.

Hips tilting forward, Eliot’s mouth stilled against his, drawing in a deep breath through his nose as Quentin pulled him out and started to stroke him. “You said something before,” he said, his voice wavering slightly. “About what you wanted to do to me.”

“Remind me,” Eliot said, burying his face in his neck as he rocked forward into his hand.

“Eliot,” he said, tightening his hand around him. He could feel him hardening underneath his fingers. “You said…”

Eliot's mouth closed over the juncture of his neck and his shoulder, his teeth digging into his skin for a moment before he soothed the area with his tongue. “I know what I said. Tell me, tell me what you want.”

_Oh, god_. “Iwantyoutofuckme,” he said, the words coming out in a rush, but it was enough, it was enough to have Eliot pulling his hands away from him, rolling him onto his back and pressing him down into the mattress with his body. Quentin spread his legs so he could slot between them, groaning at the feel of him hard against him as he grinded down on him.

He was getting hard again himself, worked up just from the idea that Eliot wanted him like this. It shouldn’t have been a big deal — he’d been with other men since Eliot, had fucked and been fucked by other men (and one woman who _truly_ knew what she was doing), but… but this was something that he and Eliot had never done, and he_ wanted_ it, wanted _Eliot_ so badly. Wanted to feel every inch of him working his way inside him, wanted to watch his face as he moved in him.

He… _wanted._

Smirking at Quentin’s protests, Eliot sat back to remove his slacks, pushing his underwear down with them and tossing them into the pile of clothes accumulating on the floor beside the bed. Settling again between his legs, he knelt over him, holding himself up with his hands on either side of his head. “_Please_ tell me you have lube.”

Pushing himself up onto his elbows, Quentin kissed him quickly, before moving him aside with his hand on his waist to give him room to slip out from underneath him. “Don’t you know,” he said, stumbling over to his overnight bag, which had fallen off the side of the bed some time ago. Kneeling down beside it, he dug through it until he found his toiletry bag, fumbling inside until he found the small bottle. “Weddings are for hooking up. You have to come prepared.”

Turning back to the bed, he found Eliot lying in the same spot that he’d been in just seconds ago, one arm reaching back to adjust the pillow behind his head. Lube and condom in hand, Quentin crawled onto the bed, dropping them onto the bed by Eliot’s head as he bent down to kiss him. “I see,” Eliot said against his lips. “_You_ were the one orchestrating this all along.”

“If that makes you feel better,” he said, wrapping his hand around Eliot’s cock and swallowing his gasp.

It was like magic, the way that Eliot sank back onto the bed under his touch. “Mmm, that does make me feel better,” he said, laughing breathlessly as Quentin squeezed him tighter.

He shifted his hands to Eliot’s shoulders when he pulled them away, let himself be pulled more fully into his lap. Grabbing the lube, Eliot squirted a generous measure onto his fingers and reached down between his legs, and Quentin held his breath at the first brush against his opening. “Relax, Q,” Eliot said, and Quentin let out his breath in a huff, a protest that he knew what he was doing stalling on his lips when he felt the tip of a finger slip inside him.

“Oh,” he gasped, his body wanting to press down onto him and lift up all at once. He held still, his legs trembling from the tension, and felt Eliot’s other hand soothing up and down his thigh. “I’m good,” he said, forcing his body to relax, sighing as Eliot pressed deeper inside him.

He was so distracted by the stretch that he jumped slightly when Eliot’s other hand wrapped around his cock, and that along with Eliot’s mouth on his throat made it easy to focus on the good feeling of being filled, of the sensations that ran through him when his finger started to slide more easily inside him. He was grinding down against him by the time Eliot added a second finger, clutching at him when he added a third. Eliot moved inside him expertly, spreading his fingers in a way that stretched him perfectly, curling them to rub against his prostate in a way that had him desperate for more.

He couldn’t wait any longer. His hands fumbled across the quilt, searching blindly for the condom he’d thrown there, wrapping his fingers around it tightly when he found it. Eliot twisted his fingers just as he straightened up, and Quentin rocked down against him, pressing his chest against his and his face against his neck. “I want you,” he said, tearing the packet open as quickly as he could with his hands caught between them. “Now, I — _El.”_

“Yeah, yeah,” he murmured, pressing in with his fingers again in a way that made Quentin tremble against him. His breath hitched when Quentin grasped at his cock, holding it while he rolled the condom over him with his other hand. “Where’s the — fuck, Q, lube.”

The lube was cold on his fingers, but Eliot only arched up into his grip when he slicked it over him, stroking him slowly. He gasped when Eliot removed his fingers, reluctantly pulled his own hands away when Eliot grabbed his thighs and pulled him closer. He held Eliot still as he positioned himself over him, moved his hands to Eliot’s shoulders when he replaced his hand on his cock to line himself up. He was… he pressed against him, _right there_ but not slipping in, and Quentin’s thighs trembled from holding himself up. He wanted it so badly, never wanted this moment to end.

“Q,” Eliot gasped against his neck, hips moving underneath him just enough to increase the pressure but not to slip in, and Quentin couldn’t hold back anymore.

Wrapping his arms around his neck, he clutched at him tightly as he pressed down on him, groaning at the stretch. He worked himself down slowly, gasping in a breath when he moved past the head and the discomfort gave way to the overwhelming feeling of being filled up. He was so _big — _he'd never been filled like this before. Eliot’s fingers were digging in hard to his thighs, his hips lifting in little aborted thrusts every few seconds. Quentin was breathing hard by the time he was fully seated on him, his chest feeling tight, lost in the way he could feel every inch of him moving inside him.

One of Eliot’s hands left his thigh, wrapping around the back of his neck and Quentin let him pull him back enough to kiss him. His mouth was much less incessant on his than his grip on him suggested and, in disbelief that he was being so well cared for even now, even like this, Quentin cupped his face with both hands, tilting his head to deepen the kiss. Eliot moaned into his mouth, kissing him back harder, his arm slipping around his waist and tugging him closer, and Quentin felt the movement all through him.

The weight on his chest lifted, and Quentin shifted his hips against him, grinding against him just to feel the way he moved inside. He wanted more, wanted everything. Shifting his weight back to his knees, he lifted up, breath hitching at the slide of Eliot inside him, pausing for a moment before sinking back down on his cock. Quentin’s hand fisted in Eliot's hair as he broke the kiss, both of them groaning against each other’s lips as he started to build a rhythm. Eliot’s hands dropped to his hips, his fingers digging into his asscheeks, squeezing as he started to move over him faster. “Fuck, Q,” he moaned.

“Uh huh,” he said, unable to think past how good Eliot felt inside him. Quentin heard his legs moving on the bed behind him, felt his grip shift on his hips slightly, and then cried out when Eliot started thrusting up into him. He gripped at him tightly, squeezing his eyes shut against the pleasure that shocked through him each time. “Oh god.” He gasped at Eliot’s broken laugh, bent to bury his face against his shoulder, his body curling over him. “Oh shit.”

It felt so good, too good, and it took Quentin a minute to process how to move, how to breathe, how to think. He found a rhythm again, rocking his hips down each time Eliot thrust up, each movement tearing a moan from him that he tried to muffle in Eliot’s neck. His hands danced over Quentin’s back, gripping at his shoulders, his hips, lips and teeth moving against his shoulder, and Quentin felt closer to him than he’d felt to _anyone_.

Something like desperation sparked in him, and when he pulled back to look at him, slowing his hips to a grind as Eliot continued to move in him, his breath left him at what he saw on Eliot’s face. His brows were knit together, his lips red and parted, his eyes bright and dark as he gazed up at him. He couldn’t… he couldn’t believe it, that this was _Eliot_, _Eliot_ was looking at him like he hung the fucking moon as he fucked into him as deep as he could, and Quentin’s throat constricted.

He ran his hands up his chest, over his shoulders, reached up to cup his face, smooth his thumbs over his cheeks while Eliot just _looked at him_, little moans falling from his lips every time he rolled his hips forward. Eliot, who… who at one point he’d honestly thought he was going to spend his life with, who he’d been planning a future with in his head even when he was too scared to think he could have a future with _anyone_, who was the only person who’d made him feel like he could be whoever he wanted to be. “El,” he whispered, overwhelmed with the knowledge that this was just tonight, that it couldn’t mean anything but it meant _everything_, and… and it couldn’t be love he was feeling because one night after ten years apart wasn’t love, it was a blend of nostalgia and being swept up in the moment but god, _something_ was tearing him apart from the inside, and he couldn’t, he couldn’t… “_Eliot_.”

His name came out like a sob, and embarrassment filled him at the way Eliot’s eyes widened in surprise. Quentin drew back, biting hard on his lip against the way it made Eliot shift inside him, covering his face against how fucking ridiculous he was to be so caught up in all of this. “Sorry,” he mumbled. “Sorry, I — _fuck.”_

Firm hands wrapped around his wrists, pulling his hands away. “Don’t do that,” Eliot said, sounding pained, and Quentin squeezed his eyes shut at the feeling of lips soft on his cheek. His arms came around him, pulling him tight back against him again, and Quentin willed himself to stop trembling. “I’m here, okay? I’ve got you.”

Quentin forced in a deep breath and then let it out in a rush, and when he pulled back Eliot was waiting for him, cupping his face tenderly, his kiss slow and soft and deep when he pulled him in. It fortified him from the inside out, holding him up and knitting him back together. “I’m…” He bit back the apology on his lips, knowing Eliot wouldn’t want it. “It’s just… a lot,” he said, his lips brushing Eliot’s with every word.

“It’s a lot,” Eliot agreed gently, his fingers pressing against his scalp as he kissed him again. Quentin felt him move, felt the tension in his shoulders that told him he was trying not to. He rose up on him, swallowing Eliot’s gasp and then his surprised moan as he sank back down. Quentin’s breath left him at the feeling, and knew he’d never get enough of this. Eliot gripped at his back, tightening when he moved over him again, groaning when Quentin continued to move over him. “I really missed you, Q,” he said, his voice thick with everything Quentin felt.

Eliot shifted his grip on him, and then Quentin’s breath left him as the room spun around them. He let out a small, surprised laugh to find the mattress underneath his back, and felt comforted by the answering glint in Eliot’s eye before bent down to kiss him. Maybe he wasn’t too much after all, or maybe he was and it was okay, he was okay, he was… he was really fucking good, as Eliot guided his legs wider apart, lining himself up. Quentin’s legs hitched over his hips, pulling him closer, and he could feel his smile against his mouth when he slipped in so easily.

Eliot pressed him down into the bed, kissing him hard like he would consume him and Quentin, Quentin would _let_ him and he would say _thank you._ He surrounded him completely, holding himself up with his elbows bracketing his head, his chest flush with his, and Quentin smoothed his hands up his sides, over his back, lower to grab his ass and pull him into him. His lungs were burning but he only kissed Eliot harder, not willing to give up even a moment of this.

The way they were pressed together had his cock trapped between his stomach and Eliot’s, and every time Eliot thrust deep into him, the way he rubbed against him caused a shock to run through him. Eliot’s mouth slipped from his, his head dropping to press against Quentin’s neck as his thrusts became more erratic, his hips snapping into his faster and harder until Quentin couldn’t breathe from the force of it. “Fuck,” Eliot groaned, his voice tight by his ear. “Fuck, I — Q, I —”

“Yes,” Quentin gasped out. “I want… come, El, I want to feel you come, come in me, I want you…”

The sound Eliot made when he stiffened above him reverberated through Quentin’s chest, and he held onto him tightly as he thrust into him once, twice more before he stilled in him, his whole body shuddering. Quentin gasped at the feeling of Eliot throbbing inside him, moved his hips up against him automatically to feel him deeper, whined at Eliot’s desperate huff of laughter. “Fuck, Q,” he sighed as he slumped, his breath hitching as he rolled his body over Quentin’s. “That was…”

“Yeah,” he said, still hard and aching and trying not to rut up against Eliot’s stomach any more than he already was. “Eliot…”

“Mmm.” Quentin held his breath as Eliot pulled out, waited impatiently as he lifted off enough to deal with the condom, held onto his arm to stop him from moving off of him properly as he leaned over to toss it in the trashcan on the other side of the bed.

Settling back over him once more, Eliot started to slip down the bed, kissing a line down his chest. Quentin held him fast, pulling him back up to lie over him, arching his body up to feel the press of him all over. “Wanna feel you,” he murmured, and felt Eliot smile against his skin.

“Okay, sweetheart,” he said, and Quentin choked back a moan when he felt Eliot’s hand wrap around him. He thrust up, almost dizzy with it to finally have attention on his cock once more. Eliot shifted his weight to one side, still lying on top of him but giving him room to stroke him, his legs tangling with his in a way that left his hips free to move with him. The lazy way he nuzzled against Quentin’s neck contrasted with the tight, swift movements of his hand, and Quentin’s chest tightened as he clung to him.

Each stroke wound him tighter, pulling at each of his nerves until he was a writhing mess underneath him. “Oh — oh, El — _oh_.” It was too much, he felt like he was about to burst out of his skin but Eliot didn’t slow, and Quentin jerked up into his fist over and over again until he felt the pressure snap inside of him, flooding through him until he started to tremble, and still Eliot stroked him through it. He barely felt the splatter on his stomach, didn’t realise he’d arched up off the bed until he fell back onto it. He sucked in a long, shuddering breath, turning his head toward Eliot’s when he felt him still pressed against him. His legs twitched as Eliot gave his softening, oversensitive cock a final tease before he pulled his hand away.

He felt boneless, weightless, incredible. He felt — cold, when Eliot’s weight slipped off of him, and he opened his eyes, whining in protest before he could feel embarrassed for the sound. Eliot’s eyes were warm with delight when as he climbed off the bed, and Quentin pulled his reaching arm back to his chest. “I’ll be right back,” he promised.

Still trying to calm his breathing, Quentin let his eyes slip closed. Less than a minute passed before he felt the bed dip beside him, and opened his eyes to see Eliot leaning over him with a damp cloth, and he smiled up at him tiredly as he wiped it over his skin. The look in his eyes was so incredibly fond, and when he leaned back to leave the bed again Quentin grabbed his hand and pulled him back down beside him. “The cloth,” he said, and then laughed when Quentin took the cloth out of his hand and tossed it across the room in the general direction of the bathroom.

Reluctantly, he let Eliot pull the sheet out from under him and slipped beneath it, reaching for him as soon as he settled beside him. Eliot pulled him in eagerly, and Quentin curled around him, his leg slung between his, his head on his chest. He relaxed under the sensation of soft fingers stroking his hair back, lips on his forehead, the sound of Eliot’s steady heartbeat in his ear.

Too much hung between them, too many things that weren’t right to say, that he couldn’t ask. He didn’t want to ruin it, this perfectly easy, content, stretched out moment between them. He wanted to wrap this up, this whole night, but mostly just this, the way his skin felt warm against his, the slow, calming breath, in and out. “I’m really glad you were here tonight,” he murmured against Eliot’s chest.

Eliot’s arm tightened around him, just a little. “Me too,” he whispered, and Quentin was still smiling when sleep pulled him under.

* * *

Something was buzzing, and Quentin squeezed his eyes more tightly shut, burrowing in closer to the warmth wrapped all around him. The body he was pressed up against _— Eliot_, he thought with a rush — shifted slightly, and the buzzing stopped. Quentin stirred — if he was leaving he had to… to get up, but then warm arms surrounded him again, a hand on the back of his head pulling him back down against… against his chest, and he let himself fall back into sleep.

* * *

Quentin woke, and felt the bed cold beside him.

Squeezing his eyes shut against the light peeking through the edges of the curtains, he reached across the bed, searching blindly for someone he knew wasn’t going to be there. Eliot was long gone. Quentin rolled over onto his side of the bed, pressing his face into his pillow. His warmth had left the sheets, but his scent lingered and he breathed in deeply, feeling light in the knowledge that last night had really happened.

He gripped the pillow tighter, and stilled when he heard a crinkle of something that wasn’t bedsheets. Reluctantly opening his eyes, he picked up the piece of paper, noting the hotel’s logo at the bottom before he looked to the curling, elegant letters.

_Q —_

_I know I said I’d wake you, but you have no idea how adorable you look while you’re sleeping. Don’t hold a grudge, okay?_

_Let’s not talk about how hard it is to say goodbye. I already fucked up the last one. I’m sorry I was afraid. You reminded me last night what it’s like to be brave, and I’m going to hold onto that._

_If you don’t keep in touch, Margo’s going to murder us both._

_— El_

Closing his eyes, Quentin rolled onto his back and dropped his hand to his chest, unclenching his hand when he heard the paper crumple. There was a weight on his chest, something that was not quite regret, not quite longing, not quite joy but a blend of all three and more.

He was… damn he was _tired_, probably a little hungover, but he felt more himself, more alive, than he’d felt in years. He wondered if Eliot felt the same. Was he on the flight home to LA already? Almost certainly.

He wished for a few more hours, another day.

But this was it, this was all he had. And that was okay.

Clutching the note to his chest, he let his mind drift over last night, savouring every moment. The way he’d felt when he’d first seen Eliot, his panic as Julia explained why he was there. The thrill of dancing with him, of seeing his smile, of hearing him laugh. Every moment spent in this bed. He sank into it, breathing it in, let it steady him.

Opening his eyes, he smiled up at the ceiling. A glance at the alarm clock on the bedside table told him that Julia and the others were probably waiting for him for breakfast, but they could wait a little longer

He was going to hold onto this feeling for another minute.


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Quentin moves to New York.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This was originally supposed to be more of an epilogue, but then the word count got away from me and my usual enablers pointed out that there was something that's better suited as an actual epilogue to come after this.
> 
> The comments for the first few chapters have been so incredible. Thank you for reading! I hope you enjoy the end of the main story <3

“No — stop, wait.” Julia’s hand reached out to slap his away, and he stared at her in affront as he pulled back from his coffee. “You’re a big shot New Yorker now, Q. You have to take pictures with all of your food.”

“This is coffee,” he told her blankly, glancing down at the cappuccinos on the table between them. Also — there was no way he was going to be a person who took pictures of his food.

Julia sighed, rolling her eyes with what he felt certain was an unnecessary amount of frustration. “Okay, fine. But at least take a selfie with me.”

That, he could do. And if his smile turned forced as he shifted from his seat to the one beside her, wrapping his arm around her waist and leaning in as she snapped more shots than was actually required, then he didn’t think anyone could blame him.

This was the last time he was going to see her for a year.

Well, that wasn’t entirely true. The internet was a thing that existed, and they already had a Facetime date set up for Tuesday. Both of them already had alerts on their phones for sales on airfares. It was going to be fine.

She was just about to leave him in a huge city without a single person he knew.

_But it was going to be fine._

Lowering her phone, Julia didn’t complain when Quentin stayed close, and he was grateful for it. He kept his arm around her as she cropped the photo, applied a filter, and uploaded it to Instagram, loading it up with a handful of hashtags that started with #NewYorkNewYork and #GoodbyeForNow, followed by a handful of others that he didn’t take in.

_It’s going to be fine._

“You’re going to be fine,” Julia said quietly, and he couldn’t help the quiet laugh that escaped him. “What?” she said, smiling at him. “You are! You’re going to do amazing things with this writers program, Q. I can’t wait to see it.”

Taking a deep breath, he let himself actually believe it, just for a moment. Well, believe in the possibility of it, anyway. He wouldn’t have accepted the residency if he hadn’t thought he’d be able to do something good with it, and he _was_ excited for what this next year would bring him. He hadn’t been to the library space that would be his for the next twelve months yet, but he was already itching with the urge to get started.

It hadn’t even been twenty-four hours since their flight had landed, and he’d spent most of that time doing a quick exploration of the streets surrounding his apartment and setting up his meagre belongings in the small space that would be his home this year. So far he only had the bed that had been delivered last night (that they hadn’t bothered to put together yet, opting to sleep on the mattress on the floor instead), and his suitcase worth of belongings. He was here for a fresh start, a new adventure, and he was looking forward to furnishing his new space with the things that belonged to New York Quentin.

He was also planning on travelling home on his next visit with an empty suitcase, ready to pack up a whole heap of his things when he inevitably got homesick and wanted _his _copies of his favourite books rather than the ones he could borrow from the library.

His phone buzzed in his pocket, breaking him out of his musings over what he could bring with him on his next trip back from Chicago. Pulling his arm back from around Julia, he slipped his phone out of his pocket and clicked on the Instagram notification. He still wasn’t used to using much more than Facebook and lurking on Twitter, but he was trying to get his head around how to actually use Twitter and Instagram since social media hype was a part of the deal with the Rupert Chatwin Residency.

Grimacing at the picture Julia had taken of the two of them, he wondered whether he looked as uncomfortable to everyone else as he’d felt in that moment, as he felt looking at it now. Underneath the photo were the people who’d already liked the post, and his heart skipped a beat when he saw a familiar name amongst the list.

He wasn’t sure whether Julia had felt him stiffen or whether she could just read his mind by now, but she was leaning into him to look at his phone screen before he could click out of it. She stayed pressed against him even as he locked the screen and put his phone face down on the table in front of him. “Are you still pretending to be okay about all of that?”

“Of course I’m okay about it,” he said, too quickly. But what was he supposed to say? _I haven’t stopped thinking about the night I spent with my ex-boyfriend two weeks ago, but he lives on the other side of the country and we have our own lives to live. We’re friends on social media now though so it’s all totally _fine. “It is what it is. It’s not a wedding unless you get drunk and bang your ex, right?”

He could feel Julia’s eyes on him, and breathed a quiet sigh of relief when her phone buzzed and she looked away. “We should probably start heading to the airport,” she said reluctantly, surprising Quentin when she let it go so easily. But then, it wasn’t the first time they’d had that conversation over the last two weeks.

And when it came down to it, he _was_ okay. He hadn’t been pining after Eliot for the last ten years, and he wasn’t pining after him now. Not… not really. There was a big ‘what if’ hanging over him every time he thought about that night, but he hadn’t had any expectations then and he didn’t have any now.

What he did have, was a good friend back. Two, actually, he thought as he saw Margo’s name pop up when she liked the picture. That was what mattered.

Turning his mind from Eliot, he drained the last of his coffee and left a tip on the table before following Julia outside.

* * *

Closing the door behind him, Quentin leaned back against it and looked around his apartment. The late afternoon sun filtered in through the large windows along the wall, lighting up the blank slate that was his new life.

Taking his time with the decorating had seemed like a good idea when Julia had been here with him.

Alone, the space looked too empty, too bare, too large.

Sighing, he pushed off from the door and walked over to the kitchen bench, setting his keys and his wallet down. He should buy a bowl to put his keys in, right? That was a thing that people did? Maybe he should buy some plants.

He _definitely_ needed to buy some food. Opening the fridge that he’d bought on Craigslist yesterday and paid extra for the guy to deliver this morning, he stared at the single bottle of soda for a few seconds before he pulled out the pizza box. There were two slices left from last night’s dinner, and he took them into the bedroom, curling his legs underneath him as he sat on the mattress.

Yeah, okay, he should buy a couch. A futon or something would be good, right? And — more immediately, he should probably put his bed frame together. He eyed it, unable to regret spending his time exploring with Julia rather than getting her to help him set up his new home like she’d come with him to do.

He’d figure it out. The bed frame wasn’t urgent.

It was kind of pitiful to miss her already though, right?

Taking a deep breath, he forced himself to face that head on, to acknowledge it and then discard it. Yes, he missed her. He missed James, he missed his dad and his friends, he missed his old apartment and his old room and his old bed. But he was here to do something great, had been given the opportunity to do something great, and he was going to make the most of it.

Feeling marginally better (and a little surprised that his self-pep talk was working), Quentin started making a mental checklist of the basics that he would need to stock his fridge and his pantry. He probably had enough time to get to the grocery store today, if he got his shit together. Shoving the last of the pizza into his mouth, he paused when his phone buzzed in his pocket, and choked when he saw Eliot’s name on the screen. Forcing himself to swallow, he clicked open the message.

**Eliot: ** _Why didn’t you tell me you’re in New York?_

He stared at the words, trying to force them into some sort of sense in his head. _Should_ he have told Eliot he was in New York? He hadn’t made a big deal about it on social media, wasn’t planning to aside from something pre-approved by the program once his scholarship was announced in a few days. He and Eliot had exchanged a few messages since the wedding, but nothing that led him to believe that he owed him an explanation of his whereabouts.

The words on his phone screen didn’t change, no matter how long he looked at them, but the intent in them went back and forth in his head. Was that an angry message? Was Eliot hurt, confused? Why would Eliot have expected him to tell him he was here?

Before he could even start to consider how to respond, the dots appeared to signify that Eliot was typing again. Quentin held his breath as he waited for the words to appear. They disappeared and lit up three times before he received a new message.

**Eliot:** _ Let me try that again. I didn’t know you were going to be in NY. If you have time while you’re here, I’d love to see you._

Which… only made _less_ sense. _If you have time while you’re here_.

While you’re _here_.

_What?_

Swallowing down the lump in his throat, Quentin typed out a response, fretted over his wording and then pressed send before he could rewrite it a dozen times.

**Quentin: ** _You’re in NY? What a coincidence! How long for?_

It was a full minute before his phone buzzed in his hand.

**Eliot: ** _Quentin. I live here._

_Oh, shit_.

* * *

The nervous, churning feeling in Quentin’s stomach was replaced, temporarily anyway, by surprise when he pushed open the door and stepped into the bar. The space was well lit at this time of the day, and he could see how the dark wood would look stunning at a lower light when the mood inevitably shifted. People were scattered along the bar and at the small tables in twos and threes despite the early hour, and the soft music flowing through the space created an easy atmosphere.

He _shouldn’t _have been surprised, really. Eliot had always had impeccable taste.

Quentin glanced around the space but couldn’t see him, behind the bar or on the floor, so he hovered by the doorway, unsure of his next step. Should he ask for him? Should he just sit and wait? Should he turn around, go back to his apartment, and pretend none of this had ever happened?

The decision was taken from him by the sharp gaze of the woman behind the bar. Her dark hair was pulled back into a high ponytail, the liner around her eyes making her blue eyes appear even brighter. She looked him up and down, appearing entirely unimpressed. “Are you Quentin?”

“Um.” He took a few steps toward the bar, not wanting to have this conversation across the room. Another look around told him Eliot still wasn’t in sight, so he approached the bar, his nerves spiking higher when the woman continued to stare at him. “Yes?”

She raised an eyebrow skeptically. “Are you sure?”

“No, I mean — yes, yes I’m sure, yes I’m Quentin.” He tried not to think too hard about the fact that Eliot had told his co-worker that he was coming. “Is Eliot —?”

“Eliot said to tell you he’ll be down in a few minutes. You want something while you wait?”

The bartender set two fingers of whiskey in front of him, and waved him off when he pulled out his card to pay for the drink. “On the house.”

Quentin forced a thank you around the lump in his throat, but she’d already turned away so he climbed onto the barstool beside him and took a sip of his drink. He busied himself looking over the variety of alcohols stacked on the shelves behind the bar, tried to avoid his reflection in the mirror behind them.

His eyes found themselves staring back at him anyway. He didn’t _quite_ look as dishevelled as he felt, but still. Tugging at the hair tie around his wrist, he considered tying his hair back but then settled for running his hand through it, trying to look like he hadn’t been rushing through the city in order to not be late because he’d changed his outfit three times before he’d left.

Setting his hands on the bar, he took a deep breath. He didn’t have anything to be nervous about. It was just Eliot. His friend, Eliot.

Quentin downed the rest of his drink and set his glass back on the bar.

A movement out of the corner of his eye caught his attention, and he made himself wait a few seconds before he looked up. His heartbeat picked up at the sight of Eliot striding towards him on the other side of the bar. He knew his mouth was stretched into a dumb smile when he stopped across from him, leaning forward with his forearms resting on the bar, but he didn’t care. “Hey,” Eliot said softly, his smile cautious as his gaze darted all over his face, his eyes sparkling like a prince out of a goddamn Disney movie. “Fancy seeing you here.”

Quentin realised he’d been holding his breath, and let it out slowly, quietly so as to avoid notice. He swallowed down his dumb _do you come here often_ joke. “Yeah,” he said instead, his voice only wavering just a little. “Small world, huh.”

It wasn’t until Eliot reached for his glass that he realised his hand was still wrapped around it, and he wondered whether the brush of fingers against his was deliberate as he pulled it out of his grasp. “Do you want another?”

The first drink had done nothing in the way of settling his nerves. “Oh,” he said, not wanting to put him out. Eliot was the one who’d suggested he meet him here, but he didn’t want him to get the impression that this was why he’d come. “You don’t have to.”

“What’s the point of owning a bar if you can’t give free drinks to your friends?” Eliot said, taking a second glass from the rack behind him and a bottle from the top shelf. His pour was more generous than the other bartender’s. Did he need the fortification, too?

The sleeves of his shirt were rolled up to his elbows, and Quentin was _definitely_ not staring at the way his hands, his forearms moved, was _not_ distracted by how efficient he looked behind the bar.

He reached out to take his glass back, but Eliot picked them both up and nodded toward the row of booths along the wall. “Let’s get some quiet.”

Quentin glanced across at the woman at the other end of the bar, who was now slicing lemons, before following Eliot in the opposite direction. “Your bartender is —” terrifying “— nice,” he said, slipping into the booth across from Eliot.

“Don’t let her hear you say that,” Eliot warned him with a raised eyebrow and a grin. “And Marina’s the manager, actually. Don’t let her hear this either, but I couldn’t run this place without her. Especially with the travel between here and LA.”

“Yeah,” Quentin said. “LA. Where you live.”

Eliot lifted his glass to him before he took a drink. “LA, where I _used_ to live, before I moved here when I opened this place.” He looked at him pointedly. “Like I told you at the wedding.”

_Like he…_ Quentin stared at him, incredulous. “You did _not_ tell me you lived in New York at the wedding.”

Screwing his face up, Eliot nudged his glass across the table toward him. Did he look like he needed it that badly? “Hmm, no I did,” Eliot said as Quentin took a too-large mouthful of whiskey. “How do you know you didn’t forget?”

He didn’t even need to consider it. “Because this weekend _I _moved to New York, and I would have remembered if you’d told me _you_ were going to be in New York.”

“Yeah, well I would have noticed if you’d told me _you_ were moving here, and I definitely don’t remember that, either.”

It suddenly felt way too warm in the bar. Quentin pressed his hands between his thighs to keep them still. He’d been playing this conversation over and over in his head since he’d gotten Eliot’s message, since he’d realised that he wasn’t pulling a prank.

It’s not like it changed anything, right? They’d both made a choice. They’d made a choice ten years ago, and they’d done the same two weeks ago.

Except Quentin would have _remembered_ if he’d known that he was going to be living in the same city as Eliot, and _Eliot_ would have remembered, too.

It didn’t change anything. It didn’t matter.

It mattered a lot, to Quentin.

He really needed to figure out how to make his heart stop pounding so hard.

Eliot was watching him with an expression he couldn’t quite place. His lips were pressed together in a mimic of a smile, but his eyes looked uncertain. Quentin watched his Adam’s apple bob as he swallowed. “So, when you say you moved here…”

“I wanted to tell you at the wedding, but I’m not supposed to talk about it until it’s officially announced on Tuesday. I…" _Fuck it. _He was only a few days out from being able to talk about it, and he wasn’t going to tiptoe around this anymore, not with Eliot. "I was selected for the Rupert Chatwin Writer’s Residency.”

It still didn’t feel real, but the words were coming easier, and the way Eliot’s face lit up sent a thrill through him. “Well, shit,” he said, laughing quietly. “That’s incredible.” His eyes softened. “You deserve it. You’re going to do something powerful with it, Q. I know it.”

Quentin’s chest tightened. Clearing his throat, he reached for his drink, taking a sip before he spoke. How did Eliot's belief in him make him feel stronger and more apprehensive all at the same time? “That’s a lot of pressure,” he said, trying to keep his tone light. He was pretty sure he just sounded desperate.

His heart jumped when Eliot reached across the table. He watched intently as he brushed his fingers over his before turning Quentin’s hand over and slipping his into it, palm to palm. Carefully, Quentin curled his fingers around his hand, and raised his eyes. The corner of Eliot's mouth twitched up into a small smile that only just failed to be a smirk. “I have faith in you.”

He couldn’t stop the rush that went through him to know that Eliot thought he could really do this. His thumb stroked over the back of Eliot’s hand, and he let his breath out weakly, watching him wet his lips. “I’m really glad you’re here.”

Eliot glanced down at their hands, and then back up at him. “I’m sure it’s a relief to have a friend in town.”

A friend. Was that all he wanted? But he was the one who’d reached out for him, and Quentin didn’t want to let go. "Yeah,” he said slowly. “Something like that.”

Silence stretched out between them, but it wasn’t awkward. Tense, and heavy, but not awkward. There were so many words on the tip of his tongue, words like _I know that night shouldn't have meant so much, _and _how does it feel this easy after so long_, and _please don't say that it's just me._ All of them caught in his throat. Eliot’s hand tightened around his.

A crashing sound jolted him out of the moment, and Quentin jumped, twisting to look across the bar to the group of people standing around one of the tables, stepping away from a dropped glass. Embarrassed for flinching, he turned back to Eliot, and paused when he saw that he was still watching him with a smile. Slowly, Eliot glanced over the bar, and then back to him. “Can I show you around?”

"Oh," Quentin said, pulling himself the rest of the way out of his thoughts. That uncertain look was back in Eliot's eyes, and it hit him again, right then, that this was _Eliot's _bar — one of his bars, and he straightened up in his seat, looking around the space with new eyes. "Yes," he said firmly. "I'd love that."

Eliot pulled him to his feet, and didn't let go of his hand as he took their empty glasses over to the bar. He pointed out the piano on the other side of the open space, the artwork on the walls, and beamed at him when Quentin asked about the detailing on the bar itself.

Quentin felt that funny nervous excitement from being somewhere that he knew he shouldn't be as Eliot led him around the other side of the bar and into the kitchen, pausing at the door to hold it open for the woman stepping out. "Q, this is Faye. She works the bar and is only marginally less likely to murder you than Marina."

Faye paused, smiling in a polite sort of way that didn't quite meet her eyes. "Hi," she said.

Quentin realised too late that he was staring at the electric blue streak in her hair, and bit back his automatic explanation that he was only staring because of how awesome it looked. His rambling never helped anybody. "Hey."

A raised eyebrow to Eliot later, Faye had turned and was gone through the door. Eliot's hand untwined from his, settling on his lower back half a second later, and Quentin let him turn him into the kitchen. The warmth of his hand through his shirt immediately erased any lingering awkwardness.

It looked like a fairly standard professional kitchen, albeit small, but he didn't imagine that they'd need to serve more than fries and onion rings and mozzarella sticks. He glanced up at Eliot (and paused when he realised how close they were standing, how casually _close_), and caught a hint of a grin before he straightened his face.

A gruff curse on the other side of the room made Quentin stiffen, and he turned to see a man bent over the bench on the other side of the kitchen, a full glass by his elbow. He hadn’t noticed him. “This is Mayakovsky,” Eliot said cheerfully, “who's usually half a bottle down before he starts his shift but makes the best sliders this side of Midtown. He is also the only person I trust to use that fancy piece of Russian equipment that I can’t even pronounce the name of and which cost more than three months lease on this whole building."

Quentin eyed the Mayakovsky, who was steadfastly ignoring them, before following the direction Eliot had waved toward to look at the huge appliance that took up half of one of the benches. “What does it do?”

He turned back to Eliot in time to catch the end of his unfazed shrug. “Something _very_ important, if you ask Mayakovsky. If you figure it out, let me know.”

Eliot led him back into the main area, past the bathrooms down the hall and through a door that he had to unlock with a pin code. The door closed behind them, and the noise from the bar dimmed a surprising amount. “Break room slash my office,” Eliot said, gesturing to the space that opened up on the left. Quentin looked around, taking in the comfortable looking couch, the bar fridge, television on one side of the room, and the desk on the other. “If I could only tell you how many hours I spend here, pouring over expense reports, and orders, and marketing profiles,” he said with a wistful sigh and a hand held over his heart. “Remind me what daylight feels like on your skin, won’t you?”

Snorting, Quentin rolled his eyes at Eliot and got a grin in return. Truthfully, he was blown away by the life that Eliot had built for himself. “I can’t believe this is all yours,” he said, and was sure he saw a flash of pride on Eliot’s face before he smoothed it over.

They’d made their way back to the door but Eliot had turned toward the left instead of right, and it was only then that Quentin noticed an elevator across from the door. Eliot’s finger hovered over the button for a few seconds, but with a quick glance at Quentin, he pressed it firmly. The doors opened instantly, and Quentin followed him inside, wondering distantly where the elevator led, but most of his thoughts were caught up in watching Eliot. “It suits you,” he said slowly as Eliot turned to face him. “All of this,” he added at Eliot’s quizzical look, nodding back in the direction that they’d come. “This whole ‘building your empire’ thing, and just — the work, I guess, and the leading people. It just suits you.”

Eliot pressed his lips together, but his eyes were alight. "Well, I'd say you're missing the tweed and the glasses, but I have a feeling you're more likely to write in your pajamas than anything else."

"I'm going to have an office," he protested, not bothering to hide his smile. He felt giddy just from the _thought_ of telling him that he usually just slept in his underwear. "I'm not wearing my pajamas to work," he said instead.

The elevator dinged as it came to a stop, but when Eliot didn't look away, neither did Quentin. Eliot's smile, when he gave it, was much softer than he'd expected, and when he shifted his weight to his right foot, it brought him slightly closer to Quentin. "I think New York's going to suit you, too."

Quentin's heart was beating so loud he was sure Eliot would hear it. He held his gaze for a moment more before turning to step out of the elevator, and Quentin's shoulders dropped, disappointed. He'd thought that maybe Eliot would… that maybe he wanted… He could still feel the burn of his hand on his back, feel the warmth of his hand in his, and he'd let those things convince him that he might be as excited to find him in New York, and for the same reasons.

Because he couldn't pretend that he hadn't been thinking about their night together ever since it had happened. And not just the sex — as mind-blowing and life-changing as it had been. He wanted to take him apart, and be taken apart in return, and then for the two of them to build back together stitch by stitch. He wanted to know him, and _be known_.

He wanted Eliot. Every part of him.

And he wasn't imagining the way Eliot glanced at him every few seconds, or the furrow in his brow contrasting with the smile tugging at his lips.

It had been a long time, but not so long that he didn’t recognise that Eliot was _nervous_.

He watched Eliot as he walked backwards into the room behind him. “This,” he said, gesturing widely, “is my apartment. The soundproofing is incredible, you can’t hear a thing from downstairs.”

Quentin took a quick glance around the room, not really seeing any of it before turning back to Eliot. Eliot, who was still watching him, his eyebrows lifted slightly, anxious about _bringing him up to his room._

He didn’t have to wait for him to make the first move, Quentin realised. He’d been making the first move this whole time.

Closing the distance between them, Quentin cupped Eliot’s face with both hands, pulling him down as he rolled up onto the balls of his feet to kiss him.

Eliot stilled for the barest second before relaxing into him, his hands finding Quentin’s waist for a moment and wrapping around him, pulling him close. Elation filled his chest and bubbled up out of his throat, and Quentin was laughing as his hand reached further to delve into Eliot’s hair. He felt Eliot smiling against his lips before he took advantage, tilting his head to deepen the kiss, and Quentin felt the thrill of it through every inch of him.

They were still standing just inside Eliot’s living room. Quentin pulled back slightly, his breath catching in his throat when Eliot brushed his lips against his jaw. “You didn’t finish giving me the tour,” Quentin told him, sighing when Eliot’s arms tightened around him.

“You want… the tour?” he said, and the smile in his voice was just as much of a rush as the way he kissed him.

“Yeah, show me your bedroom.”

Making a sound halfway between a laugh and a groan, Eliot brought one of his hands up to curl around the back of Quentin’s neck, and Quentin leaned into the kiss, his hand slipping down to grip onto his shoulder. Eliot’s other hand wrapped around his, and he kissed him harder for a moment before he pulled away, tugging him across the room.

They made it to the hallway on the other side of the room before Eliot span around, turning in toward him and then all he could feel was Eliot’s body flush with his, one thigh slipping between his and pressing him back against the wall. Eliot kissed him with a hunger that rivalled his own, his hips rolling forward into him, and Quentin moved with him, the pressure and the closeness and _Eliot _pulling a moan from him as he felt himself start to harden, his pants growing tight.

His chest was burning when Eliot pulled away, and he gasped in a breath as Eliot bent his head to kiss along his neck, his lips — and oh, his _tongue _— making his body arch into him. "This is my hallway," Eliot murmured against his neck.

God, how could he make _that_ sound sexy? Quentin tangled his fingers in his hair again, holding him against him as he tried to force his brain to work enough to play along. "It's great," he managed, groaning when Eliot rocked forward against him again and he felt him hard against his hip. "I really like the — _oh shit_, the um — the you in it."

He felt Eliot shaking against him, grinned when he realised he was laughing. "Just wait until you see my bedroom."

Groaning loudly, he tugged Eliot back until he could see his face, and felt a thrill at the way his skin crinkled at the corners of his eyes. "I am _trying_," he said, and pulled Eliot in to press his mouth against his.

Impatient, he pushed off from the wall with his shoulders with enough force to make Eliot step back. He finally took the hint, breaking the kiss with a gratifying sound as he wrapped an arm further around Quentin's waist and pulled him down the hall.

They stepped through a door, and Quentin was on Eliot as soon as he’d kicked it closed, leaning up to kiss him with all of the want that he’d tried to make insignificant for the last two weeks. He still couldn’t believe it, that Eliot was _here_, and that he _wanted him_. His chest tightened in a way that had nothing to do with desire, but Quentin poured it into their kiss anyway, tilting his head to kiss him deeper, parting Eliot’s lips with his own and moaning at the answering slide of his tongue over his.

Quentin stepped backward when Eliot pressed forward, letting him guide him backwards until his legs hit the edge of the bed. He’d take notice of the likely impeccably decorated bedroom later — right now, he couldn’t think of anything past wanting Eliot’s body against his, and wanting that again and again and again. He wanted — fuck, he wanted _everything._

He pulled Eliot with him as he fell backwards, rolling them until he was straddling Eliot in the middle of the bed. He grinded down against Eliot’s automatically, feeling the hardness of him against his balls through two pairs of pants, and the way Eliot’s breath hitched sent a rush through him. Eliot’s hands gripped tightly at his hips as he bent down to kiss him, fumbling between them to tug at the buttons of his shirt.

He tried to move lower, to kiss his way down his chest as he worked his shirt open, but Eliot’s hand on the side of his neck kept him where he was. Eliot’s kiss, when it came, was softer, slower despite the obvious want of his body, and Quentin pressed himself down closer from hip to chest, sighing when his arms wrapped around him tightly.

He wondered if Eliot felt something even close to the wonder rushing through him. He had a feeling he might.

When Eliot’s hands dropped lower, curling over the curve of his ass as he rocked up against him, Quentin moved with him eagerly. Eliot’s mouth stuttered underneath his, breaking the kiss, and Quentin dropped his head down to his neck, taking the path that he’d intended before as he resumed undoing Eliot’s buttons.

Working the last one open, he slipped his hands underneath the edges of it, pushing it open and shifting down to bite gently at the top curve of his pec. The satisfied sound Eliot made when he closed his lips over his nipple was so much better than what his memory had conjured up since the wedding, and when he twisted the other between his fingers, Eliot’s back bowed off of the bed. “Mmm, do that again,” Eliot said, and then sighed when he repeated the motion, flicking over the other with his tongue.

Quentin smiled at the wordless protest that he made when he pulled his mouth away, and again at the way his breath hitched as he sucked a mark into the skin just above his hip. He was soothing his tongue over the darkened skin as he started pulling at Eliot’s belt, when he felt Eliot’s hand on his shoulder. “You’re wearing too many clothes,” he said, tugging at the neck of his shirt.

“Says you,” Quentin said. Shifting back up the bed so that he was kneeling over Eliot’s thighs, he started unbuttoning his own shirt, his blood pumping too hard to waste time on making it look good. The way Eliot’s eyes darkened as he sat up to strip his own shirt off his shoulders told him that maybe he was doing an okay job of it anyway. Quentin’s arms were still caught in his sleeves when Eliot reached for the button of his jeans, and he stiffened as his hand slipped inside, grasping him lightly through his underwear. “Oh,” he gasped, grinding himself against his hand, flushing when he grinned up at him. “Eliot —”

“Yeah?” he said lightly, despite the strain in his voice, squeezing just so.

_Oh my _god_ what a fucking tease_. Quentin wanted to take him _apart_. “Roll over,” he said thickly, pulling Eliot’s hand away and reaching down to tug at the button of his slacks. “Take these… off, and…” He faltered, doubt pressing in on him as he realised that, aside from their time at the wedding, and his time-hazed memories of the things they’d done when they were together, he didn't know what Eliot _liked_. “I could… if you want…”

“Anything you want,” Eliot said, his eyes wide and sure. “Q, I... “ He sat up, and was almost at Quentin’s eye level despite the fact that he was sitting on his lap. He looked at him in earnest, his hands firm on his hips. “Anything you want.”

“I kind of… want to fuck you,” he said, the words falling from his lips on an exhale. He was overwhelmed by the blatant desire in Eliot’s eyes, couldn’t believe that it might be because of him.

The corner of his mouth quirked up, but the heat never left his eyes. “Kind of?” he teased.

“I really want to fuck you,” he said, firmer, and felt Eliot shiver beneath him. Letting that fuel his confidence, he bent down to kiss him again, gasping when Eliot palmed him through his underwear again. “_Fuck — _okay, I —” He kissed him again, feeling almost dazed with it, before he forced himself to focus enough to tug at Eliot’s pants.

He lifted his hips to give Quentin room to slip them down, and before he could move off of him to pull them off the rest of the way, or — shoes, they were still wearing _shoes_, why_ — _Eliot had pushed Quentin’s jeans down over his hips and his underwear with them, and Quentin’s whole body shuddered when his hand wrapped around the both of them. “Eliot,” he gasped, bucking forward into Eliot’s hand, gasping at the drag of Eliot’s cock, hot and hard against his own, at the squeeze of his fingers all around him.

Reaching between them, he fisted his hand around them above Eliot’s, watching his brow furrow, his mouth fall open as he thrust up into their hands. “Oh — yeah, that’s —” Eliot’s voice cut off on a gasp as his head tipped back, and Quentin dipped his head forward to press his lips against his throat.

It took more willpower than he’d thought he possessed to pull his hand away and Eliot’s with it. Eliot sucked in a deep breath but didn’t protest, sitting up to remove his shoes the moment that Quentin had climbed off his lap.

For the sake of speed, Quentin moved to the edge of the bed, kicking off his shoes hastily before he slipped out of his jeans and underwear as well, and when he turned back, one knee on the bed, he froze at the sight before him. Eliot was kneeling upright in the middle of the bed, completely naked and half-turned toward him. The setting sun pouring in through the window cast orange light over his body, highlighting each perfect angle of him — the rise of his cheekbones, the line of his collarbones, the jut of his hips. The long, full arch of his cock.

Quentin dragged his eyes up to Eliot’s, and found his gaze roving over him just as thoroughly. He dared to hope that he might be even a fraction as pleased with him as he was with Eliot, if only because of the colour rising high on his cheeks. After a moment he lifted his eyes to meet Quentin’s, his smirk unapologetic. He lifted his chin, which only sent the curl of hair falling across his forehead further into his eyes. Quentin’s hands itched with the urge to push it back, to trace his fingers along his cheek, to put his hands anywhere, everywhere. “Where do you want me?” he asked, looking at him over his shoulder, and it was obvious from the deep way he pitched his voice, from the spark in his eye and the way his teeth caught at his lower lip, it was _obvious_ that he was doing this on purpose, but it didn’t stop the desperate edge that threatened to overwhelm him.

The lump in his throat felt too large to push words past, so Quentin moved up onto the bed behind him, pressing his body flush with Eliot’s from behind. His hands on his hips held him still as he rocked forward into the cleft of his ass, rutting against him lightly. The sound Eliot made, just from that, spurred him on.

Moving his hands to Eliot’s shoulders, he pressed a kiss in between them before he pushed him gently forward until he was supporting himself on his elbows and knees. Quentin continued to kiss his way down his spine, and felt Eliot’s chest expand when he must have realised where he was going. At the small of his back, Quentin pulled his hands back to flatten over his ass, massaging lightly at it for a moment before he used his thumbs to spread his cheeks apart. Eliot shivered and, realising that he must have felt his breath against him, he leaned closer and he exhaled again, just to see him so worked up without even a touch.

He wanted to see how he’d react to more. Slipping his hand closer to the middle, he stroked the pad of his thumb lightly over the puckered hole, revelling in Eliot’s moan. Quentin's eyes drank in the sight of him, the way his back arched, his shoulder blades sticking out as he leaned back into the touch. “Who’d have thought you’d grow up to be a fucking tease,” Eliot said, his shaky breath catching when Quentin rubbed at the skin surrounding his opening just a little harder.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Quentin said, leaning in to press the flat of his tongue against him.

Eliot’s head dropped down forward, a surprised moan falling from his lips as he pushed back. Closing his eyes, Quentin tightened his grip on him, keeping him still as he licked around his hole and then over it once more, and again until Eliot was squirming on the bed before him. “Fuck, Q. That’s — _oh_.” He gasped as Quentin let go of his hip with one hand, slipping it lower to cup his balls, massaging them lightly. Eliot’s legs slipped wider, but Quentin pulled him back up just enough so that he couldn’t hump the bed.

He was aching with the need to be touched again, considered getting his knees out from underneath him so he could find some friction against the bedspread himself, but that wasn’t how he wanted it. He wanted Eliot to wring every ounce of pleasure out of him, wanted to give him everything he could.

Pulling his cheeks apart a little wider, he worked at the puckered hole with a gentle touch, slowly pressing harder with his tongue until he was pushing inside, just a little. Eliot was trembling beneath him, moaning on every quick breath as he licked into him, crying out every now and then in a way that made Quentin glad he resisted the urge to take himself in hand — he was sure he would have come just from the sounds he was making if he’d had any friction at all.

Eliot whimpered when Quentin pulled back, and then groaned when he replaced his tongue with his fingers, pressing inside him just to the first knuckle. He tried to push back onto it, but Quentin’s other hand remained firm on his hip, holding him still. “El —”

“Top draw,” Eliot said immediately, throwing an arm out in the direction of the bedside table, and then bringing it down hard against the mattress when Quentin closed his mouth over him again, fluttering his tongue over him. “Jesus fucking _Christ_, Q.”

Grinning, Quentin gave him one last kiss before climbing off the bed. He paused when he opened the draw, eyeing the large dildo that was incredibly realistic except for the bright purple colour, and the smaller, baby blue vibe, before grabbing the bottle of lube and taking a condom from the box.

When he turned back toward the bed, Eliot had turned over and was sitting with one leg tucked underneath him, leaning back on his hands as he watched Quentin. The arch of his eyebrow and the amused twist of his lips told him that he knew exactly what he’d seen in there, but he tucked that away for later, tossing the bottle and the packet onto the bed.

Climbing on top of Eliot, he wrapped his arms around his shoulders as he caught him around the waist, and Eliot leaned up to kiss him as they fell together back down on the bed, moaning into his mouth as he rolled his body up into his. His leg hitched up over Quentin’s hip, and Quentin grinded down against him, revelling in the feeling of his hard cock rubbing against him.

“How much did you think about it?” Eliot asked, as Quentin fumbled for the lube, slicking his fingers up, shuffling down a little so that he could reach down between Eliot’s legs. One of Eliot’s arms was hooked around his leg, keeping it pulled back, and his other hand squeezed Quentin’s shoulder as he slipped a finger inside him. “Since the wedding,” he gasped, angling his hips so that Quentin’s finger slid deeper. “How often did you think about me?”

He knew he didn’t mean in general. He’d have scoffed at the idea of Eliot getting worked up on the thought of Quentin getting off on his memories of their night together, but the idea of _Eliot_ doing the same both hit him somewhere deep in his chest, and made his cock twitch all at the same time. “Every time,” he confessed into his skin, and felt Eliot’s hand tighten on his shoulder again. He slipped his finger out and then back in again, and again, pulling lightly on the ring of muscle at his entrance to stretch him before he added a second. “I thought about everything you did to me, and all of the things I wanted to do to you.”

Eliot’s head pressed back onto the pillow, his mouth parting in a gasp when Quentin curled his fingers inside him and found his prostate. “What else do — _shit_ — you want to do to me?” he said, letting out a gasping laugh when his breath caught twice.

He wanted… anything Eliot wanted. He wanted to rub at that spot inside of him until he was trembling under his touch, and so he did, kissing his neck and rutting in small circles against his thigh. He wanted to not leave this bed until he’d relearned everything that Eliot’s body liked, every sensitive spot, every ticklish bit of skin. He wanted to see his eyes light up when he smiled. He wanted him to be there, this time, when he woke up the next morning, and the morning after that, and the morning after that.

Quentin’s fingers slowed inside of him, pushing himself up onto his elbow so that he could see his face. Eliot’s pupils were blown, his curls a mess falling over his forehead, the flush on his cheeks spread down his neck. Quentin ducked his head to press his lips to the centre of his chest, and then risked a glance up at him again. His heart was thundering in his ears. He took a leap. “I want to take you out. On a date, to — to dinner, or something, I don’t know, I don’t care, I just… I want to do this for real. Go on a date with me, El.”

He held his breath as Eliot’s eyes widened. “Oh my god, Quentin, you can’t —” Dropping his leg, Eliot covered his face with his hands, his whole body shaking, and Quentin froze when he realised he was laughing. “You can’t just ask someone out on a date when you have your fingers up their ass.”

Hastily, Quentin pulled his fingers away, and Eliot drew in a sharp breath, dropping his hands from his face. “Sorry, I — okay, I —” He started to sit back, not sure what to do or what Eliot wanted.

Eliot grabbed his wrist, pulling him back down on top of him. “Yes. Take me out. Or, I’ll take you out, since it’s not like you know any of the good spots. But yes, Q, I want _all _of this. With you.” Quentin leaned into Eliot’s hand when he cupped his cheek, reaching higher to smooth back his hair. “But I really want you to fuck me first, if that’s okay with you.”

His throat was tight, and his laughter came out like a gasp. “Yeah. Yeah, I can do that.”

Quentin rolled the condom on, then held still as Eliot slicked him up with lube, his eyes fluttering shut at the sensation as Eliot stroked him. Warm lips kissed at his neck, and Quentin let himself swim in the feeling for a few seconds before he pushed him back onto the bed. Eliot brought his legs up, and Quentin caught one with his arm while he reached down with the other to line himself up. He pressed against him without pushing in, just to feel Eliot squirm beneath him.

None of his fantasies had come close to feeling as good as this, and he wasn’t even inside him yet. Eliot’s free hand found the back of his neck, pulling him down to kiss him, and Quentin’s cock slipped inside, just a little. Quentin groaned, and pushed in until the head of his cock had moved past his entrance.

He hadn’t asked, but he had to know. “Did you think about this?” he asked, and then whimpered when Eliot lifted his hips, causing Quentin to sink deeper. “Did you —”

“Yes,” Eliot said, dropping his leg to grab onto Quentin’s waist, and Quentin hooked his elbow underneath it, bending both of his legs back a little further as he leaned down to kiss him again. “Yes, Q — I haven’t stopped thinking about what — what you felt like, what you tasted like, how you… sounded,” he said, as Quentin pulled back a little and then thrust in deeper, moaning as he was surrounded by tight heat. Eliot was already breathing heavily. Quentin’s willpower vanished with the rocking of his hips against him, and he pressed forward the rest of the way, biting down on his lip to quieten his cry when he bottomed out. Eliot clutched at him, making little noises every time he shifted even a little. “You feel…”

He sounded blissed out, and he trailed off before he finished the thought. “Tell me,” Quentin said, feeling desperate with the need to know. He pulled out almost all of the way before thrusting back inside, slowly. Eliot let out a low, ragged moan when his hips were flush against his ass. Quentin repeated the motion, and then circled his hips a little once he was fully seated inside him. “Tell me.”

Quentin leaned back enough to see his face, and lost his breath at just the sight of him. His eyes were squeezed tightly shut but he opened them as Quentin watched him, his brow pinching as he thrust into him again. “You feel so good in me, Q. Quentin.” Something passed over his face, and when he pulled Quentin back down to kiss him, the sound he made was thick with more than desire. “I can’t… you’re _here…_”

“I know,” Quentin said, pausing so he could pour everything he had into kissing him. Or, he tried to — when he felt Eliot clench around him lightly, he couldn’t stop his hips from bucking forward. He broke the kiss to breathe, but couldn’t move further than to drop his face into Eliot’s neck, breathing in the scent of him, the feel of him. It hit him, then. This wasn’t a one time thing. They could have this tomorrow, and the day after, and the day after that. “Me either.”

Eliot moved his hips again, drawing a gasp from him. “I’m not letting you out of this bed for a week.”

Laughing, Quentin shifted his weight more fully onto his elbows to give him more leverage and started to move, thrusting into him long and slow. His world quickly narrowed to the drag of Eliot’s body around him, the grasp of his hands, the broken, desperate sounds that they made. Quentin dropped one of his legs to grab onto his shoulder instead, clinging to him as he found a faster rhythm, and Eliot’s hands roved over his back, gripping at his sides, at his ass, pulling him down harder into him, angling his hips until his whole body stiffened. “Oh fuck, Q — yes, there, don’t —”

Groaning, Quentin thrust faster, sliding against just the right spot to have Eliot crying out every time he moved. Leaning on his left elbow, he reached between them and wrapped his hand around Eliot’s cock, letting the movement of their bodies work him up into his fist again and again until Eliot was shaking. “Quentin, I… _oh, oh _— _oh Q —”_

Quentin cried out as Eliot clenched tightly around him, his back arching and then he felt wet heat spilling onto his fist, hitting his stomach. Eliot’s voice sounded hoarse as he moaned into his neck, his hands clutching at his back, nails digging into his skin.

It was a heady thing, and overwhelming, to feel Eliot coming around him, because of him, and Quentin was… Fuck, he was so close, already frantic with it as he started to thrust erratically, chasing his own orgasm. His hand flattened on the bed and then twisted in the bedspread, heedless of the mess he was spreading. “El,” he whimpered, and felt Eliot’s hand curling around the back of his neck, his lips lazy on his throat, his name whispered against his skin and then Quentin’s hips were jerking forward, the tension inside him snapping as pleasure ricocheted through him and he came, trembling, in Eliot’s arms.

Reality came back to him slowly, but through it all he knew that he didn’t want to move. Eliot’s shoulder was warm underneath his cheek, his hands soft as they stroked lightly, up and down his back, and Quentin would have been content to stay like this forever. He could feel himself growing oversensitive and softening in a way that was about to become a problem, however, and pressed his lips to Eliot’s skin before reluctantly pulling out of his arms.

“There’s a trashcan in the bathroom,” Eliot said, gesturing to the door on the other side of the room. Screwing his face up as though the idea of moving were a personal affront, he pulled himself up against the headboard, reaching over to the bedside table and pulling a packet of wet wipes from the top draw.

Quentin took care of the condom and cleaned himself up while he was at it, and when he returned from the ensuite Eliot was lying on the bed again, his arms and legs strewn across most of the surface. He’d pushed the quilt to the bottom of the bed, a problem for later. Quentin hovered by the bathroom door, pausing to take in the long lines of his body and a little caught in the thought that he had the opportunity to wrap around that glorious body. He was still staring when Eliot opened his eyes, the corner of his mouth lifting in a smile. “I know you’re a cuddler. Are you just going to stand there all day, or…?”

Trying not to look too eager, Quentin walked back over to the bed, taking Eliot’s hand when he reached for him and letting him pull him down onto the bed. Eliot turned into him, cupping his face with both hands as he kissed him, before letting one trail down over his shoulder, settling on his back and pulling him in close. Eliot pressed another kiss to his cheek, to his temple before pulling back a few inches. His hand rested between his face and the bed, and Quentin turned his head to touch his lips to his palm as Eliot shifted on the bed, tangling their legs together.

He just wanted to lie here all night and not think about the outside world, not think about anything outside this bedroom, but the nervousness manifesting in his stomach was already starting to make itself known. He had to be sure. He had to be clear about what he wanted, and hope that Eliot felt the same. And if not… well, he didn’t want to think about that. “I meant it,” he said, reaching up to brush his knuckles over Eliot’s cheekbone, to smooth away the worry lines that appeared when he started talking. “I don’t want this to be just… this.” He gestured between them. Eliot raised his eyebrows at him, and Quentin rolled his eyes, nudging him with his knee. “Yeah, okay, _this_ is good, this is great, I want lots and lots of this.” He caught his bottom lip between his teeth, hoping he’d understand. “But I want more than that. I want…”

_Everything_ was too big a word.

It was the _right_ one. He swallowed it down.

“To take me on a date,” Eliot said when he trailed off, his hand leaving his back to brush his hair back from his face.

“Yeah,” he said, meeting his gaze evenly. “To start with.”

Eliot’s face lit up, and he felt a swell of relief.

“I have issue with the ‘to start with’ part.” Eliot stroked his thumb over his cheek before his arm slipped down to wrap around his waist. “We can’t have our date tonight, and I don’t plan on waiting until after tomorrow night to start doing all of the delicious filthy things I want to do to you.”

He was spent, but his body still warmed at the thought of what _delicious filthy _things that he might mean. “You have plans tonight?” he asked, trying to temper his disappointment. The date aspect was just to make a point, it wasn’t the important part, but he’d hoped that they’d be able to spend the evening together. Didn’t want to make the first move to leave at all, if he had the choice.

“We do,” Eliot said. “Margo’s delighted you’re here. She’s meeting us at our favourite place for dinner, and then…” He paused. “You can come back here. Or if you want, you can go back to your apartment. Or _we_ could go back to your apartment…”

He was still _nervous_, Quentin realised, surprised, and felt a twinge of guilt that it made him feel better to know that this mattered to Eliot as well. He leaned forward, closing his mouth over Eliot’s until he relaxed against him, and then kissed him some more just because he wanted to. “Here is better,” he told him, not even considering the idea of the two of them going their separate ways tonight. “My bedframe is still in a box.” Pressing his face against Eliot's neck, he felt his pulse against his lips, slow and strong and sure.

"Here it is then," Eliot said softly, and then paused. "Although I _am_ invested in how securely your bed is put together. I might have to supervise."

"Or, help," Quentin said, laughing.

"Hmm," Eliot said, and when he pulled back to kiss Quentin, he was grinning. "You’ll have to persuade me."

"I'm sure I'll figure out a way."

Eliot pulled their bodies flush together, and Quentin wiggled closer still, not quite able to believe that he got to have this. Eliot, all wrapped around him, and wanting _more_. He thought back to just before the wedding — he'd never have expected this. Two months ago, he hadn't imagined he'd be in New York at all, with the chance to chase his dreams.

And to know he had Eliot by his side while he did it, and Margo, and Julia just a phone call away… he couldn't ask for anything more.

This was… really a thing that was happening. Him and _Eliot, together…_

If he’d known second chances like this existed, he’d have hoped for them a long time ago.

Rolling onto his back and pulling Quentin with him, Eliot kissed the top of his head, and Quentin let out a long, satisfied sigh. "Julia's going to flip when she hears about this."

He felt Eliot's quiet laugh vibrate through his chest. "I bet. I can't wait to tell my friend James — maybe you've heard of him?"

Groaning, Quentin swatted his shoulder, only for Eliot to catch his hand and bring it to his lips. "I wouldn't bother. I know a James, and he has terrible taste in friends."

"Is that so?"

"Uh huh."

"The bride's best man at his wedding was pretty hot, though."

"Oh, really?” Quentin murmured, leaning up to press his lips against his jaw. “I hear he's off the market.”

Eliot hummed as he tightened his arms around him. "Good," he said softly.


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Three years later...

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you so much to everyone who's supported me through the writing of this, particularly Riz and Gigi and the folks on RAO. If you've commented or kudo's this fic, you've made my day. I hope you enjoyed these two idiots being a mess for each other.

“Quentin! Hey, Quentin!”

Smiling apologetically at Fray, he excused himself and turned toward James, who was approaching him with a grin. “Hey, um — okay?” he said, throwing a bewildered look back at Eliot’s cousin as James grabbed his arm just above the elbow and started dragging him across the room. Fray watched him blankly, shrugging a little as if to say ‘what do you want me to do about it?’”

James let go of his iron grip, only to slip his arm through his instead. “There’s someone you just have to meet.”

Frowning, Quentin dragged his feet — uselessly, since James had no difficulty at all as he pulled him along. “But I know everyone here?”

“Yeah, but just wait.” James pulled him up to the bar, where he found Eliot, surprisingly alone for the moment.

The way Eliot’s face lit up when he saw him made his chest swell, and Quentin lost track of everything except for his warm smile, the sparkle in his eye, the automatic way that he reached for him. He was brought back to reality, however, when James snatched Eliot’s hand before he could take hold of it. “Eliot! Such a coincidence that you’re here! I want you to meet my friend Quentin.”

Eliot groaned, shaking his head at James and taking his hand back so he could slip his arm around Quentin’s waist. “I actually thought we might have a chance of making it through the night,” he said to Quentin forlornly.

“We were best friends in college,” James said, ignoring Eliot. “And Q? I knew Eliot in high school. I have a feeling you’re going to hit it off. Wait,” He continued without pausing, wide-eyed and thoroughly pleased with himself. “You’ve _met before?_ Are you _kidding me?_”

“James, this is our _wedding_.”

“_Yeah, _it is_!”_ James punched the air, his grin taking up most of his face. “You are _welcome._”

Sighing heavily, Quentin looked up at Eliot, who shrugged at him helplessly. “You don’t honestly expect him to stop doing that any time soon, right? You know this is our lives now.”

“Resign yourself to it now, Q,” James said. “I _will_ be introducing you to each other on your fiftieth anniversary.”

Quentin gasped, twisting back to look at James. “I still have to be friends with you in fifty years?” he complained, and then laughed as James punched him lightly on the shoulder.

He let the momentum, weak as it was, push him back into Eliot, and melted against him a little when he felt his arm tightening around him. He’d take as many jokes about it as James wanted to throw at him, as long as he got to have this right along with it.

He still couldn’t quite believe how much his life had changed over the span of a few weeks, three years ago. If Eliot hadn’t been at Julia and James’s wedding. If he hadn’t been offered the Rupert Chatwin Writers Residency.

He wouldn’t be standing here now, with Eliot’s arms around him — his childhood sweetheart, his husband.

Eliot pressed his lips against the side of his head, and Quentin wondered if he was caught in the same memory.

He was pulled out of it when he saw Julia approaching. Her smile was infectious, and Quentin found himself returning it easily. She’s been such a pillar of support for him, well, _always_, but particularly in the last few weeks. He was forever grateful that their friendship had remained just as strong as ever, despite the fact that they lived in different cities now. “Is James bragging about his role in the two of you getting back together again?”

“That would imply he stopped,” Eliot said.

“True,” Julia said, and then turned to Quentin, her eyes going sharp. “Tell him.”

He stilled, not quite sure what she was talking about, but _Jesus, Julia, way to bring the drama._ “Tell who what?”

Huffing as though it were obvious, Julia pointed her thumb in James’s direction. “Tell him about the thing. You said you wanted to wait until after the wedding, and now it’s after the wedding. So — tell him.”

_Oh. That_. Quentin felt the blend of excitement and apprehensiveness and pride that all seemed to churn together in his stomach every time he thought about it. “But it’s… midway through the wedding?”

“The important part’s done,” she said, waving her hand dismissively.

“Um, excuse you,” Eliot said, and Quentin glanced up over his shoulder to see his eyebrows raised high as he looked at Julia. “There’s still at least two hours on that bar, thank you very much.”

“Uh-huh,” she said, rolling her eyes at him with a smile. She was only distracted for a moment though, before she turned back to Quentin. “Now, spill.”

“Yeah, Coldwater,” James said, his curiosity and excitement clear on his face, despite not knowing what they were actually talking about. “Spill.”

Eliot’s arm dropped from his waist, his hand trailing down his arm to lace their fingers together and then squeeze his comfortingly, and he glanced up at him questioningly, his lip caught between his teeth. He didn’t have to ask what Eliot thought. Quentin had wanted to wait until after everything was done, to not take the focus away from the fact that they were getting _married _today, _holy shit_ — but Eliot had been adamant the whole time that celebrating his victories was hardly going to take away from their happiness.

Yes, he _knew_ he was being dumb about it, but he didn’t want to spend his whole wedding day talking about his book.

It was easy to fall into the excitement that had been bubbling inside him since he’d gotten the news a few days ago. At Eliot’s nod, Quentin turned back to James, giving into his grin. “The publisher accepted the final edits for my book, and they’ve confirmed the release date. My debut novel will be on the shelves this November.”

“Oh shit, Q!” James laughed, stepping forward to pull him into a hug. “Congratulations! That’s incredible, man.”

Eliot’s hand slipped out of his, and Quentin returned the hug, swallowing down the sudden lump in his throat. It was hard to believe that he had this support system, that he had this happiness, this _life_. “Thank you,” he said as he pulled away. Turning back to the others, he saw matching expressions of joy and pride on Eliot and Julia’s faces, and felt his throat closing up again. “Thank you.”

“We know, you couldn’t have done it without us. I’ll read all about it in your acknowledgements.” Julia stepped forward, leaning up to kiss his cheek as she grabbed James’s hand. “You’re coming with me to talk to the hotel manager about letting us stay late,” she said to her husband. “He’s got a crush on you that’s visible from the moon.”

“I can help,” Quentin said, straightening his shoulders and looking after her hopefully. It wasn’t that he particularly _wanted_ to be running around chasing after things on his wedding night, but it did feel weird to have everything left up to other people after spending the last few months trying to make tonight perfect.

Or, rather, helping Eliot make tonight perfect. He’d been wise enough to not get in the way when Eliot had ran with most of the decisions.

Julia scoffed at him, just as he’d expected she would. “Don’t be ridiculous. Enjoy your party,” she said, waving at him as she and James turned and headed toward the exit.

“Better listen to your best woman,” Eliot told him, his hand settling on his shoulder, brushing his thumb along the skin above his shirt.

His best woman, because he’d gotten married today, he’d gotten married to _Eliot. _The thought made his heart do a little flip in his chest, and Quentin was in the midst of turning to beam up at him when he froze, catching sight of his death stalking across the room toward them.

The combination of Marina’s smile and the murder in her eyes made him about one thousand percent sure that he wasn’t going to survive the next few minutes.

Eliot made a small, questioning sound, apparently noticing the way he froze up, and then _relaxed_, of all things, when he found Marina approaching them. She’d only become more terrifying since Eliot had expanded to another New York location and put her in charge of it, but Eliot seemed to take her in stride in a way that Quentin knew he never would.

“Hi, boys,” she said, stopping in front of them, one hand on her cocked hip. “Super cute wedding. I almost don’t even want to stab myself just to get out of here.”

“Thanks,” Eliot said dryly.

At the squeeze of Eliot’s hand on his shoulder, Quentin forced himself to relax, and even managed to a little once his arm slipped further around his shoulders. Marina rolled her eyes at their display of affection, light as it was. “So who’s going to explain to me what the flying fuck _Todd_ is doing here?”

“Todd?” Quentin asked, startled out of imaging all of the ways Marina could kill him right where they were standing. “Todd from drama club?”

Todd, who had only been put on the invite list to annoy Eliot — who for some reason _really_ didn’t like him — until both of them had forgotten to take his name off.

“I don’t know where the hell you know Todd from,” she said, turning that same venomous smile on him for a moment before returning it to Eliot. “But you _are_ going to tell me why the hell you didn’t tell me he was going to be here.”

“Wait,” Eliot said, his eyes widening slowly, and Quentin could tell that he was trying not to smile. “Marina. Did you and Todd use to date?”

Marina finally stopped forcing that terrifying smile, screwing up her face instead. “Todd and I used to _fuck_,” she said. “He lived here for a few years before you moved here.”

The laughter that bubbled up out of him was quickly muffled at the glare she sent him, but he couldn’t let go of the absurdity that Marina and Todd were having the same re-meet cute (was that a thing?) that he and Eliot had three years ago.

Eliot snorted quietly. “Maybe Todd was the love of your life all along, and you’ve let that go right up until you run into him at a wedding ten years later?” he said, tightening his arm around Quentin to pull him close and pressing warm lips to his temple. Turning into him, he hid his smile against Eliot’s jacket.

He shouldn't still feel so _giddy_ to be loved by him, right?

He was, more so with every passing day.

The sound Marina made forced him to turn back to her, but he wasn’t going to let himself be embarrassed for wanting to swim in Eliot’s affection forever. He stayed close, his arm wrapped tightly around Eliot’s back as he met Marina’s thoroughly unimpressed look. “Gross,” she said flatly, and it wasn’t until she continued that he realised she didn’t mean the two of them. Completely, anyway. “And if you even hint the same to him, I'm going to hide a dead fish in both of your bars somewhere you’ll never find them, and another in your bedroom. Don’t even try me.”

She eyed the two of them icily before taking on that same creepily cheerful smile that she’d affected earlier. “Congratulations on your wedding,” she said, before spinning on her heel and stalking away.

Quentin managed to keep a hold on his laughter until she was a few paces away. Fingers against his jaw turned his face up, and he felt Eliot smiling against his lips when he pressed his against them. “I don’t see any tension-filled slow dances happening between those two,” Eliot murmured.

Laughing, he ducked his head for a moment before leaning up to kiss Eliot again, and again, and again. His hand had slid around to rest on his neck, his other settling on his waist, his fingers burning him through his shirt. The tension had shifted, perhaps, after three years together, but it wasn’t any less consuming. “No stolen kisses in the dark,” he said, smoothing his hands up Eliot’s chest to curl around his shoulders.

“No D-and-M’s, half-drunk on the grass.”

It was too soon when Eliot pulled back, but the unbridled joy in his eyes when Quentin blinked up at him was worth it. How could they ever have considered that they could have true happiness without each other? Eliot’s hand slipped around his, and he leaned in once more to kiss his cheek before whispering in his ear, “Come with me.”

He felt a thrill go through him at the idea of sneaking off, and he hurried behind Eliot so closely that he had to catch himself from stepping on his heels more than once. Eliot’s hand was warm and firm in his, and he followed him out of the reception hall into the hotel proper. The sounds of music and laughter — their friends and families, enjoying themselves — made him smile, and it only buoyed him up further as he followed Eliot through the foyer and into a hallway.

They rounded one corner and then another, and Quentin had no idea where they were or whether they were allowed to be here, but he didn’t stop to complain when Eliot stopped and turned to face him, pulling him in for a kiss. Quentin barely caught sight of the table along the wall, set with two vases of flowers and — and a statuette of _something_ on top of it — before Eliot was pressing him back against it, the edge hard against his ass and — _yeah, okay, yes_, he thought, blindly pushing the statuette back so he could hoist himself up.

The table only gave him a few inches of height, but it did allow Eliot to slot between his legs, allow Quentin to wrap his arms around Eliot’s shoulders and pull him in against him until they were flush from groin to chest. He couldn’t stop smiling as Eliot kissed him, couldn’t tamper down the golden light of happiness that was burning within him even if he’d wanted to. He sighed when Eliot’s fingers threaded through his hair, and was grateful that he’d left it down. His hands curled in Eliot’s hair as he kissed him, soft, sweet kisses to the corner of his mouth, his cheek, his jaw, the skin below his ear.

Eliot’s mouth softened on him until it was just a light brush of lips against his earlobe. “How’s your day been, darling?” he asked, his soft smile clear in his voice.

Biting his lip against his laughter, Quentin pulled one hand back to slide down Eliot’s chest, tucking his fingers beneath the top of his vest to rest above his heart. “Oh, yeah,” Quentin said, trying for a ‘so-so’ tone of voice and probably failing completely. “Mixed feelings, I suppose. I had to do a speech.”

“Sounds terrible,” Eliot agreed, pressing gentle kisses down his neck.

Quentin’s eyes fluttered shut as he worked his way back up to his jaw again. “But then I got cake.”

“Ooh, cake is good,” Eliot murmured into his skin.

“Yeah,” Quentin said, taking Eliot’s face between his hands and pulling him up to kiss him, firmly, with all of the longing and happiness and disbelief that was threatening to overwhelm him. He still couldn’t comprehend that this was his, that he was Eliot’s, that Eliot wanted him enough to bend down on one knee in the middle of the park twelve months ago. He pulled him closer, arching his body up against his just to feel him, and knew that he could spend forever like this, with Eliot’s arms around him and his mouth on his and — and he was _going _to, he was going to get to do this _every day_.

The sound that came from the back of his throat when he gasped for air sounded more like a whimper than a moan, his emotions spilling out uncontrollably, but Eliot was right there with him if the tight grasp of his hands around him was anything to go by.

The kiss softened to Eliot’s fingers stroking across his cheek, their foreheads pressed together. Quentin’s hands had ended up bunched in Eliot’s vest, and he kept his eyes closed, breathing him in. “I meant it, Q,” Eliot said, his voice wavering slightly, and Quentin pulled back enough to look at him. He stared in wonder at the shine in Eliot’s eyes, in the brilliance of his smile. “You’re the love of my life.”

“Eliot,” he whispered, his heart squeezing almost painfully in his chest, and he thought he’d stopped crying for the night but his vision was blurring again. Eliot’s laugh was a little broken as he wiped his thumb under his eyes, but he swallowed Quentin’s desperate _“I love you I love you I love you,”_ as he pulled him down to kiss him.

One of Eliot’s arms came more fully around Quentin, pressing their bodies closer together as he deepened the kiss, and — the night wasn’t over, not for a few hours yet, but when Eliot rolled his body slightly against his, his other hand grasping his thigh, he was ready to say ‘fuck it’ and drag Eliot upstairs to their room.

“Hey! Fuckwads!” Eliot stiffened beneath his hands, and then broke off with a laugh. The sharp click of heels accompanied Margo’s voice as it echoed down the hallway. Quentin grimaced up at Eliot ruefully, sighing when he leaned in to press his cheek against his chest as they waited for the interruption. “If you’ve snuck off to fuck in a broom closet right when you’re supposed to be doing your first dance there will be a murder.”

Not even the scowl on her face when she rounded the corner could sink his mood, not with Eliot’s arms around him, one hand stroking up and down his back as he relaxed into the steady rise and fall of his chest. Catching sight of them, she stopped at the turn in the hallway, setting her hands on her hips. “Oh look, there you are. It’s not like we’re all waiting for you or anything,” she said with heavy sarcasm, but she was smiling when she claps her hands together. “Ándale! I picked the perfect song for this, don’t fuck it up for me.”

He didn’t miss the wink she threw them before she turned and disappeared back around the corner. Straightening up, Quentin grinned up at Eliot, huffing a laugh as Eliot threaded his fingers through his hair to tidy it, and pulled Eliot’s vest straight in return. Margo and Julia both would kill them if they looked anything less than perfect for their first dance.

Taking half a step back, Eliot held his hand out for him, and Quentin had a flash of memory from Julia and James’s wedding. _Come on. I dare you_. He raised his eyes to meet Eliot’s, and watched him swallow before he spoke. “May I have this dance, Mr Coldwater-Waugh?”

Quentin breath caught. He’d never get used to the sound of that. “Always, Mr Coldwater-Waugh,” he said, and felt a rush at the way Eliot’s face lit up with joy. He put his hand in Eliot’s, felt his fingers tighten around his. “Always.”


End file.
